Our Blue Hour
by ThePriceIsMeg
Summary: Established Rizzles - happy life is suddenly turned upside down when Maura is raped; she and Jane must pick up the pieces and grow together despite the strain on their relationship. Non-graphic. Angsty/emotional/fluffy continuation of Yellow is for Friendship.
1. Date Night

_Let me address your concern right away: while rape is a central aspect of this story, it's going to focus on the emotional aftermath and recovery; I promise there will be **no** graphic descriptions. (I'll give a heads-up for the angstier parts, and other content, as we go along.) __I'll be the first to say that I won't do the heavy topics here any realistic level of justice, but please know my intentions were good. Thank you to everyone who's encouraged my writing along the way, if not for that support I would never have the nerve to try something like this. _

_I'd recommend reading Yellow Is For Friendship first because it'll make a few things make more sense, but I guess you won't be utterly lost if you haven't. As always, feedback is appreciated! :)_

* * *

_Story Content: __This story is rated M and will involve a little mild violence, rape angst (non graphic), and Rizzles sex (sometimes a little graphic)._

* * *

_Chapter Content :: Fluff and pretty non-graphic sexytime_

* * *

Long, slender fingers drum on the tablecloth. The check had taken forever to come, and it's now taking an additional eternity for the waiter to return from Middle Earth or wherever he's gone with her credit card.

Jane's eyes catch a mouth-watering figure in a maroon dress making her way across the restaurant. For .003 seconds, she feels guilty for considering her hands-down the most beautiful woman she's ever seen, until her brain catches up to inform her that it's Maura, and she's allowed.

That guy at the bar must have had a similar thought; he gets up from his seat and moves to intercept. Jane sees the whole play happening and it makes her prickle just a little bit, but she keeps her seat calmly; her girlfriend is perfectly capable of speaking for herself. (Still, she mentally plots the quickest route through the tables in case she needs to get over there and break some of his parts. She just likes to be prepared.)

He steps abruptly in front of Maura and splashes his own glass of water on himself.

"Really," Jane says out loud to no one.

Maura is gasping apologetically.

_Bra-vo,_ she thinks to herself, wanting to break into loud, very slow sarcastic applause. _Look at your stupid cocky face and I-think-I-look-like-Robert-Redford hair._

He looks like just the kind of guy Maura always used to point out, and she'd say something gross about his anterior-whatsis that was geek-speak for wanting to take him home. Seeing her talk to him does trigger some basic, illogical twinge of paranoia, but there isn't a chink in their relationship where any real worry can seep through. She's never had a relationship this strong before. It's a wonderful thing. It makes watching this not only tolerable, but kind of entertaining.

They're exchanging a few words. Jane can't tell if she really bought the water thing, but from the way she's gesturing at his shirt, she's probably offering to have it cleaned.

_It's just water, Maura._

Then she points right over at Jane. The guy looks too, and Jane returns a polite wave. He looks thrown off his groove, but recovers a second later and lets her keep walking.

When Maura returns and slides into her seat, she notices Jane largely failing to conceal a Grinch grin.

"Man, I'm never gonna get tired of that."

"What? Seeing me tell men that I'm with the most gorgeous woman in the room?"

"Other way round, but yeah." With a sideways glance, Jane catches the guy still staring from the bar seat he's slunk back to, and tips her glass at him smugly.

_"Yeah, that's right, Notbert Notford,"_ she mutters under her breath, as he averts his gaze. _"Be jealous."_

"..Who?" Maura squints. "Do you know him?"

Jane's eyes snap back to hers.

"Huh? No." She grabs the little black folder she hadn't noticed reappearing on their table, grabs her card and scribbles a tip on the bill. "Can we get out of here now?"

When Maura makes a somewhat big show of taking her arm as they leave, she nearly busts with pride.

* * *

Muscles flex smooth and strong beneath Maura's clinging hands as Jane moves above her.

They've been together a little over five months and they've only had this_ thing_, as Jane calls it, for barely one.

"C'mon, Goldilocks, just pick one," had been a blushing Jane's only input as Maura compared options the online shopping page, and she'd handled it a bit like a dead fish when they first took it out of the package. She wasn't opposed to it, she'd just really never planned on owning such a thing and had no idea how to use it, beyond the obvious. Because she was definitely going to be the one _using_ it - that had been Maura's intent in buying it. She'd taken time to explain (so thoroughly that Jane had to interrupt several times) that this doesn't mean she misses being with men; she just wants to combine a physical sensation she enjoys, with the person she loves. Jane has no problem with that.

No, the problem was the aesthetic aspect. She'd felt completely ridiculous wearing it the first time, but they didn't rush, didn't take it too seriously, and after some laughs it turned out okay. The bottom line was, Maura wanted to try it, and even if Jane had loathed the idea, she still would have tried it for her at least once.

The skill set required was quite different, and didn't exactly come naturally, and Jane had worried about being clumsy. But what she'd lacked in skill, she had more than compensated with love and attentiveness, and she'd been downright proud to get some of the most enthusiastic reactions out of Maura she'd ever heard. (And it wasn't too shabby on her end, either.)

So they've been using it a lot lately. It's not a replacement for anything else - it's just that the novelty hasn't worn off yet. Thanks to plenty of practice, Jane is rapidly mastering the craft; now her hips know a comfortable rhythm, new muscles are strengthening, confidence improving.

Lips seal urgently against lips, then break away just as urgently for oxygen. At this pace, a kiss is hard to maintain for long, but that doesn't stop them from trying.

Soft and gentle times with Maura are heavenly, but there's also something to be said for a higher-octane performance. Jane welcomes the tiny sheen of sweat on their skin, and the burn in her muscles from indulging Maura's plea for an encore. But her aggressive approach to everything else physical doesn't apply in bed; here it's all about quality, and she won't sacrifice care and control in order to crank it up to 11 no matter how encouraging her girlfriend's moans.

Jane knows when Maura's almost there by her rosy blush, by the way her eyes close, by the pitch of her voice and the way she says her name. She's proud to consider herself an expert in the field of Maura, but at the same time, she hopes she never knows _everything_, so she can spend her whole life learning.

Just as Maura begins to cry out, Jane presses lips to her throat, catching the vibration though a smiling, panting kiss. That's one of her favorite parts.

But it's after the chorus of beautiful notes dies down to sighs, after the fingers ease from digging into her shoulders, after the legs unlock and slip off her waist, when the very favorite of Jane's favorite parts begins.

She's spent the whole night lovingly guiding Maura up to this point; rather than just abandon her at the pinnacle, it's just as important to guide her back down while she's all pleasure-addled and totally unguarded. Now it's time to slow way down; time to nuzzle into the encircling arms that want her closer, but are too weak to pull her; time to press long, soft kisses all across her dampened brow. Right now, she doesn't want her to know anything except that she is adored. This is the moment when Jane's bones feel like liquid and nothing else exists.

Even after they've stilled, little aftershocks are still hitting Maura - the last at such far intervals that they both chuckle, forehead-to-forehead, when she flinches.

After, Jane drops like a well-satisfied pile of bricks on her side of Maura's bed - no - _their_ bed. She's still getting used to this being her home. They recover for a little while, just limply holding hands, cooling off, and listening to the way their breaths sometimes match and sometimes alternate.

Pursing her lips, Jane blows a jet of cool breath across her lover's skin. She'd done that once to try to tickle her, but Maura just seemed to like it, and now she does it every time they're overheated like this. Maura hums in appreciation.

After a while, when their skin finally starts to feel chilled instead of flushed, they pull up the sheets and come back together into their usual loose embrace - Maura's head in Jane's shoulder and Jane's arm across Maura's waist. It's just unbearably comfy and perfect and _right,_ and Jane still can't always believe it's real. Right on schedule strikes the usual urge to whisper _thank you_, but that might be a weird thing to say, so she says it with kisses instead of words.

Unfortunately for Jane, her girlfriend is well-familiar with a certain weakness that comes into play here. There's this window of time after making love where she's completely and utterly at Maura's service, wanting to save her from any work or worry, just to keep that intoxicated smile on her face for as long as possible. Most commonly this amounts to getting up and making something for her to eat, but it's also a time when she can be coerced into things she'd never normally agree to. Maura doesn't use it to her advantage... often.

"Jane," she asks, returning a couple of disarming kisses to the brunette's shoulder, "I want to do some shopping tomorrow, would you come with me?"

Jane snores theatrically until Maura pokes her in the ribs. Not being directly related to Maura's current physical comfort, it's still a tall order, but Jane's brain is too riddled with - _what hormone did she say does this?_ - to put up much of a fight.

"Please? It's so much more fun with you than going alone."

"Fine," she yawns, one finger beginning to lazily trail around her girlfriend's back. "'Cause I am _so_ tired of seeing you in the same old rags- _ulf,_" she receives another jab in her ribs. "Spoiler though, yes you look great, and no it doesn't make your butt look big."

"Who said I wanted your commentary on my posterior?"

"Mh, pardon me. What _did_ you want on your posterior?" Jane slides her hand down under the covers for a grab.

Kissing Maura while they're both laughing is another one of her favorite things.

* * *

_**A/N**__ - And that's what they've been up to. Tune in next time for stuff and things!_


	2. Shopping Sucks

_Holy cannoli, so many follows and nothing even happened yet! Thank you so much for the support. Here comes a bit more fluff/background and then we'll jump right in with some action._

* * *

_Chapter Content: tw for kidnapping and guns. (Nobody gets hurt)_

* * *

The handles of numerous shopping bags are cutting off Jane's circulation at her elbow. She shifts them with a grumble, dreaming of going home... crashing on Maura's cou- _their_- couch... assembling and devouring a ham sandwich the size of her head... maybe even catching the end of _The Rockford Files_, if they leave right now.

It's now going on three months since she accepted Maura's invitation to move in. Between the back-and-forth, the overnight bags, the personal items accumulating at each others' homes, and the constant need to relocate or feed one of their pets, maintaining separate residences had gotten old fast.

They'd discussed offering Jane's apartment to Angela - not that she'd ever been even pretending to search for a permanent residence, but if she _was_ ever going to move, this was the perfect opportunity. But Maura seems to actually like having Angela around, for the most part. And as much as her mother drives her nuts, Jane does agree (privately) that it _is_ kind of nice to have her close by. There's something nostalgic about living under the same roof as people she loves again. Or.. 2 very close-together roofs.

Though Angela's had been among the more lukewarm reactions when they'd first announced they were dating, she quickly became a big supporter, and Jane's been enjoying a bit smoother relationship with her mother lately. Those subtle suggestions she's been dropping for decades about Jane changing her appearance/attitude/career in order to find love have finally stopped. And there's sort of an unspoken sense of surprised respect that her daughter has actually managed to secure a stable relationship (and with someone of Maura's caliber at that). Of course it's opened up a whole new can of worms in the form of constant, unsolicited relationship advice, but that's still an improvement.

So Jane had sold almost all of her furnishings (which were redundant and inferior to Maura's), donated all the junk she could part with, and sold the apartment.

Living together has only streamlined an already comfortable, strong and satisfying relationship. The financial situation is still a slightly tender spot, though, and the subject of the only (minor) fight they've had so far.

Even though she knows Maura doesn't need it, it's in Jane's nature to wish she was able to provide nice things for her. That's something she must quietly let go, knowing she could work every day of her life and still never make as much money as Maura currently has in the bank. Though they've agreed to share expenses, Maura grabs every bill that she can reach before Jane. It's not that she thinks Jane can't afford to pull her weight; it's that she feels she ought to contribute in proportion to her wealth. Jane sees and appreciates her point, but it still makes her feel weird when it happens too much. Maybe it's partly because she still considers herself 'the guy' here - she'd feel like an absolute gigolo if she let Maura be as generous as she tries to be. She fully intends to share every reasonable expense.

Clothes do not fall under the category of reasonable expenses.

While Maura-shopping, Jane is content enough to wait outside dressing rooms and carry bags like a pack mule, but she isn't about to plunk down more money for one skirt than the total worth of her own wardrobe. Nor would Maura want her to. Maura makes it clear she'd be thrilled to buy Jane anything she wants, but Jane never sees anything she likes, nor would want Maura to spend that kind of money on her.

Trips like these make her actually long for Jane-shopping, which she doesn't even like. But at least then she can walk in, grab what she needs, pay and get on with her life. Of course, she'd be glad to buy Maura anything _she_ likes, except Maura rarely sees anything she can say she wants from Target within the bounds of honesty.

"I don't know why you wouldn't try it on," Maura mutters for the third time.

"What's the point of trying on stuff I know I'm not gonna buy?" She wouldn't wear a dress like _that_ for a Halloween costume.

"It's just for fun!"

"Trying on clothes is the opposite of fun." She shifts the bags again, rubbing at the indentations left on her forearms.

Maura huffs, holding out a hand.

"What?"

"Let me carry one."

"Fine." Jane hands over the only bag that does absolutely nothing to lighten her load; it's just the one she least wants to be seen carrying (Victoria's Secret).

"Where we headed now?" she asks, trudging along with a glazed-over look.

"Home, I suppose," Maura decides airily. "We can look at shoes a different day."

Jane isn't sure whether to rejoice for her freedom, or to get a head start on dreading the shoe day. By tossing out a few well-timed "uh-huh"s she successfully bluffs her way out of paying attention to a speech about shoes that spans the entire trek back to the parking garage.

"Where are we again?" Jane asks.

"Where are _we_?"

"Where is the _car_."

"The_ car_ is parked in space C30."

"... How do you always remember that stuff?" Jane's never gotten lost in a parking garage, but she's never memorized the freakin' number, either.

"I just do. Simple mnemonic devices can help, if you have trouble," she shrugs. "Think of something familiar to link otherwise arbitrary pieces of data. C and 30, so for example... well, Calvin Coolidge was the 30th President of the United States. You can use something like that."

"Yeah, perfect, because I, like all normal people, know all the Presidents by number right off the top of my head."

"Well, 30 is a nice round number, those are more memorable," Maura says, pressing the elevator button because Jane has no hands free. "It would take me a moment to figure out the others."

"Woodrow Wilson," Jane challenges.

This keeps Maura silent for the majority of the elevator ride. Jane can see her fingers twitch as she counts on them silently.

"28."

"Rutherford B. Hayes."

"19," she answers as they exit onto their floor of the garage. "Why are you testing me if you have no way of knowing whether these are the right answers?"

"You're always right, and it's fun to poke you in the brain. What's the B stand for?"

"Birchard."

A car drives slowly past them, and Jane automatically nudges Maura over to switch sides.

"Seriously? How do you have baby and go, 'Ooo, coochie-coochie-coo, you're so cute, I'm gonna name you _Rutherford Birchard_'?"

"Maybe he wasn't a very cute baby," Maura smiles.

"What, you can't rank all the Presidents by baby cuteness?"

"No... and that would be an entirely subjective ranking. Not to mention, there aren't likely to be photos or illustrations available of the majority in their infancy, so w-"

"Maura," Jane snorts as they approach the Prius. "Pop your trunk so I can dump all this stuff in here."

"One does not 'dump' Erdem or Lida Baday," Maura objects, fishing her keys out of her purse.

"So I can _carefully and lovingly place_ all this stuff in your trunk."

"That's better."

Jane makes a somewhat comical show of laying the bags in Maura's trunk and petting them reassuringly.

A couple more cars have rolled past, but Jane instinctively gets nervous that the latest one, a white van, is pausing before pulling into the obvious parking space. Just in case, she shuts the trunk and steps in front of Maura, ushering her toward her car door.

Maura opens her mouth, probably for a remark about Jane's over-protectiveness, when the van's side door slides open. It contains two unfamiliar blue eyes in a black ski mask, one gun barrel, and one instruction: "Get in."

Jane's fingers reach her hip just as she remembers she isn't armed.

At this angle they can't take cover behind any cars, so she's about to tell Maura to run. If they can run past the van, behind it, the guy will never be able to get a clear shot, and backing up to chase them would be way too sloppy; they could literally just sidestep this threat, and it'll be over. But there's the little matter of having that gun already aimed at them at nearly point-blank range. It's not very likely that the average kidnapper will risk attracting attention by firing a gun in public. But he certainly _could_ fire at least once - and so close, there's a fair chance he'd hit one of them. As long as Jane can make sure it's _her_ -

After barely a second to weigh the options, Jane has stuck an arm behind her to move Maura along, intending to keep herself in front as a shield. But before they can take even one full step, the guy has one foot out of the van and is grabbing Jane by the front of her coat. She uses the momentum to finish shoving Maura in the safest direction.

"Run!" She shouts, just before yelping as she bangs both shins on the way into the van. He has her in kind of a headlock and the angles are all wrong and she can't find the leverage to fight. Plus doesn't want to struggle _too_ much; with the cold metal of the gun now touching her head, the chances of being killed are roughly 100% if the trigger gets pulled.

On the bright side, though, that means for Maura it's 0%.

Except Maura has only gone as far as Jane's shove, stumbling to a stop and staring like a deer in headlights.

"Maura, _GO_!" She wrenches out one more shout. The gun digs hard into her temple, making her wince.

"Shut up," he orders, jutting his head at Maura. "_You_, get in or she's dead!"

_Go!_ Jane mouths again, darting her eyes to the side as if to push her along.

_Run. Be safe, be away from this. Just be out of it. Run. Check the license plate, get help, get away. Go!_

"Okay," Maura says quickly, raising both her hands in cooperation. "Don't hurt her! Please."

_No_, Jane frowns. _No. No. Dammit._ She considers kicking Maura away, but that probably won't do anything except hurt her and make the guy mad.

The driver steps on the gas as soon as Maura steps inside, making her topple over, and the gunman makes her close the door.

In the passing slats of light, Jane can see Maura already looking at her. _All eyes on you. Save the day, Detective Badass._ As much as she'd love to, there's still currently a gun pressed to her temple, and she doesn't have a whole lot of options.

"Gimme your purses. Where's yours?" he demands to Jane, as Maura tosses hers forward. His breath is awful.

"I musta dropped it back there," she lies, preferring him to think her phone and wallet are out of the equation, rather than in her pockets where they always are. He's certainly not calm, so she trusts that he doesn't have a crystal-clear memory to contradict her.

He releases her with a shove, and she takes her place protectively in front of Maura.

"Either of you tries anything, the other one dies," he warns, knowing she's calculating all the risks of grabbing the door handle. Reaching into his jacket pocket, he pulls out two plastic zip ties and tosses them at Maura. "Put those on."

Begrudgingly, Jane holds out her wrists and Maura fastens the tie around them, trying to leave her a little space.

"Tight!" he barks, making Maura flinch, and she obeys with an apologetic glance to Jane.

After returning the favor, Jane sets her hands down in her lap, by the lump in her coat pocket that is her cell phone.

* * *

_**A/N** - For those of you going "NOPE I'm skipping the next chapter," you've actually already read the worst of this kidnapping__, so don't be too scared._

_Serious safety seminar for a minute: parking lots and garages are prime kidnapping spots. If you must be there alone, be aware of your surroundings - if you look alert & prepared to kick ass, you're automatically a less desirable target than someone looking timid and distracted listening to music, digging in their purse, texting, etc. Always tell somebody where you're going; have keys/personal defense ready in hand (pepper spray keychain?); keep away from idling cars; c__heck that no one is lurking behind your car/in your backseat before getting in; lock as soon as you get in and drive away promptly. _

_And if someone tries to kidnap you, it's generally a better bet to drop your stuff, run, and make lots of noise. __However they're willing to threaten/hurt you to get you to come with them, they're willing to do much worse wherever they're taking you, so probably better to risk the bullet. And_ that's not as big a risk as TV makes it look - moving targets are actually incredibly hard to hit beyond point-blank range, even by trained cops; the chances you'd be hit, let alone fatally, are pretty slim.


	3. Bust A Move

_Right where we left off. _

* * *

_Chapter Content: Continuing with the kidnapping/gun tw, and a little fighting. Nothing awful._

* * *

Their kidnapper's gun sways slightly with the movement of the van, but stays trained on them. He's doing a good job of watching them. Jane had been so disappointed when he'd handed Maura's purse up to the front seat to let the driver paw through it, instead of taking his eyes off them for a moment to do it himself.

Jane's fingertips feel out her phone's keypad through the fabric of her coat pocket, hoping to punch anything 2 through 4 on her speed dial, which will get her Frost, Korsak or Frankie. The send button is easier to feel, but she's sweating bullets not knowing which number she hit. If she hit 1, Maura's phone would ring right here in her purse and maybe blow the whole thing. Or she could have gotten her mother, or Tommy - that would still be good, but it would cost so much more time, maybe time they don't have. Or she might have hit all the wrong buttons and now their lives hinge on an unattended game of Brickbreaker.

She tries not to visibly perk up at the tiny vocal note emanating from her pocket a few seconds later. _Ohcrapshutupshutup._ She has no idea how loud it really was - to her, it was ear-splittingly obvious, but she prays that her captor won't detect what he isn't listening for. Coughing a few times, she obliterates anything else they might be saying. She also has no idea who has answered. Hopefully they aren't already writing this off as a butt dial and hanging up.

"You _do_ know that kidnapping is against the law," Jane says loudly, under the pretense of addressing the driver behind them.

No response. No surprise.

"Where are you taking us?" She's not expecting them to divulge their itinerary, but she needs to make sure to sell the situation over the phone.

"Shut up," he says, irritated. That's probably all she ought to try for now.

"What do you want with us?" Maura asks from behind her. "If it's money you-"

"I said shut the hell up!" he spits, tightening his aim on them.

Jane feels Maura flinch behind her, and leans back a little, for what she hopes is both a comforting and silencing nudge. _Please, please, no nervous fun-facts, not a good time._

She's itching to tell these guys they're going to have every cop in Boston up their asses if anything happens to her, or Maura, but maybe that's not the best card to play right now. Somehow she has a funny feeling that knowing she's a cop won't endear her to them.

No more sounds are coming from Jane's pocket; if the right sequence of small miracles has occurred, help could potentially already be underway. It's unsettling to have no way of knowing whether that's the case. Even if so, that doesn't remove them from immediate danger, and all Jane's thinking about is rushing the guy in front of them.

_Kick him. Good solid kick to the face. _Her lip almost curls in a smile, imagining nasal bones crunching under her heel._ No. You're sitting on your legs. __Too hard to maneuver. Too slow._

_Trap his arm. Get the gun away. No. He's waiting for that. Too far away. You'd be telegraphing it. __And the gun could go off. Maura's way too close. No. __Driver's probably armed, too._ No. This is a losing hand. Wait for a better one. Just wait, wait. 

As it stands, a fight with two armed men is more than it would be wise to provoke.

_Wait. Be smart._

She hates waiting.

Her eyes rake the situation for any possible clues or details to relate later, when they get out of this. _When._ _That's awfully optimistic._ There's frustratingly little to go on; everything about the men and the vehicle is utterly nondescript and generic. They're facing backwards, and there aren't windows, so they can't watch where they're driving. There's no clock visible on the dash, and their agitation makes it very hard to gauge time accurately. Realistically, the ride probably continues for something like five minutes, maybe less, but it already feels like a cross-country trip.

The van makes a few short turns before it comes to a stop. After turning off the engine, the driver gets out and shuts the door.

"Open the door," the gunman directs. "No fast moves."

Jane slides it open - disappointed but not surprised to unveil the driver waiting just outside with his own gun - and waits, warily, for more information.

They're in another parking garage. She has no idea where they are, and a glance at Maura shows she's just as clueless. This one's empty. Quiet. No signage visible. Jane notes daylight nearby through what must be a stairwell, or hopefully even street access; if they can run, that's where they'll go. She points it out to Maura with her eyes.

The gunman steps out onto the concrete, and then reaches back in to grasp Maura's arm and pull her along. "Keep her here," he tells his partner, apparently referring to Jane.

Every hair on Jane's neck is raised in furious terror, having no idea what they want with Maura, or why she's not also invited. But they each still have a gun pointed at them, and while Jane would be glad to take bullets or even die protecting Maura, that would only leave her alone and still in danger. This new hand they've been dealt is no better.

Maura glances at her uncertainly. Her eyes aren't begging help, they're just scared, but also understanding; she sees what is and isn't reasonable for Jane to try here.

But Jane can't see that look and do nothing to help. She has to move now. Not because she has much hope of winning a fight, but because she literally won't be able to live with herself if she waits too long to try. She knows how to break out of her zip ties, but even with both hands free, the odds aren't in her favor. She _is_ going to get hurt. But if she can just stir up enough shit for a few seconds, it'll create enough of a disruption that Maura can get away.

It will be the driver who she'll target first, because the most important thing to do is get that gun pointed away from Maura. Maybe she'll get shot in the back by the other guy. If so, she hopes Maura will still have the sense to take advantage of her sacrifice and run.

_Maybe I'll even survive. Hey, I've done it before._

There's a small sound from somewhere near, inside the garage. Their kidnappers' attention perks up.

"What was that?" the driver asks.

The gunman rushes from view, ostensibly in pursuit of whatever the sound was. There's running footsteps. Being the only one still left inside the van, jane can't see what's happening, but it feels unplanned.

This tiny window of apparent surprise leaves them alone with the driver, and he might be a bit distracted. He's not as alert a guard as the other guy. _Perfect._ Just as Jane tenses her muscles to spring, Maura seems to act on the same thought.

The blonde jams her elbows past either side of her body, snapping the zip tie off her wrists, and she doubly surprises everyone by suddenly punching the driver in the eye, which she practically has to jump up to reach. Her form is actually pretty good, just like Jane taught her - unfortunately, he looks about as bothered as the dummy she learned the move on. Maura just stands back, still in a fighting stance but watching expectantly, assessing the results like it's an experiment instead of a fight, and he just stares back at her silently for a second, like he's trying to believe it really happened. Sheer ridiculousness is probably the only reason she got away with it; she's so not a threat that he's not really even pointing the gun at her.

If they weren't in danger, Jane would burst out laughing.

But she knows Maura's not having delusions that she can actually remotely faze this guy - she's providing a distraction.

There's no time for Jane to break off her own zip tie; she'd lose her element of surprise.

She launches herself out of the van, bowling him over, grabbing his wrist and turning to ram her shoulder into his elbow, both pulling the gun in the opposite direction from Maura and doing her best to hyper-extend his arm. The gun clatters onto the concrete beneath them.

Before she can think about grabbing it, she has to dodge a blow from his free hand, and counters by clubbing him in the jaw with her fused hands. She puts up a good fight considering her limited range of motion, but ultimately she's shaken off, and a hard kick in the ribs sends her skidding away.

She coughs in pain._ Get that gun, Maura. __Or, hell, just run. _She doesn't know which one to shout, but she has no breath right now either way.

Her side throbs and her knuckles are skinned and stinging from the concrete. _Get up. Keep him busy. _Pushing aside the pain, Jane scrapes herself immediately up off the concrete and gets back on her feet. _Keep him fighting._

Somewhere behind her, Maura gasps her name as Jane rounds on him, preparing to throw an elbow as hard as

* * *

_hhmmmmm_

_cold_

_but the_

_colors and ssssomething_

_happened and_

her eyes are rolling in different directions and she can't wrangle them

like the marbles that used to escape between her fingers and nooooo go under the piano

_pop said he won't move it for us one more time_

_"eeemeeeaaane"_

"huhmm?"

_cold_

_she's calling us inside probably_

_she doesn't like us playing in the snow_

_it'll give us colds_

"jaacooeeerme?"

She frowns faintly. "jusss lillllonger..."

_that only happened to frankie once and now she gets upset like it's my fault _

_like i control the weather_

"notgunget sick ma..."

"Jane, wake up."

The rest had been like the slow-motion whoosh of underwater but this is suddenly sharp and clear and startling like she burst through the surface. Her body flinches hard in surprise.

Her heart is beating. A lot.

_is that normal?_

"Jane? Are you alright? Can you hear me?"

Her face is cold.

The voice isn't her mother's.

The sky is cement flashing different colors and there's a smile like the clouds breaking.

_pretty_

_oh wait I know_

"Murrr?"

"Hi." The smile widens even more. There's a squeeze on her hand.

There's so much noise.

"W'happn..."

"It's okay, Jane, it's over. It's over."

"What's o-" Jane winces, confusing snapshots from the last hours playing back, like an old projection with some of the slides missing and turned upside down. "Oh. Oh g- you ? Where-"

"Shh - lie still." Maura presses gently on her shoulder, keeping her from sitting up. She's the one holding the ice pack on her face. It feels numb.

"Youkay?"

A blinding light moves over one eye and then the other. It's not until after it's gone that she decodes the earlier garbled noise as a voice saying something about her pupils.

"I'm okay. You're okay," Maura grins with relief, resting her head against Jane's for a moment. She's either laughing or crying.

There are people around. Making so much noise. It's almost deafening.

_Why can't they just let me sleep_

"How does your bite feel?" Maura asks, fingers running lightly along each side of Jane's jaw.

Jane frowns slowly, searching her body for pain. Her side does hurt... "Someby _bit_ me?"

"No- _your _bite. Occlusion."

... ?

"Can you close your mouth properly, I mean?" She tries again. "Does it feel like your teeth are aligned normally?"

"M-hm..?" Jane answers._ What, did I miss a dentist appointment while I was out?_ She doesn't have the strength to say it out loud. The left side of her face hurts and is almost certainly forming a very interesting-looking bruise, but her teeth feel right. "S'fine. Sore."

"It's a miracle your jaw doesn't seem to be dislocated from taking a punch like that. You do have a concussion, though, and I want to go with you to the hospital and make sure you're checked over thoroughly."

Jane doesn't remember getting punched, but she's not going to argue the concussion.

Red and blue light pulses irritatingly through the garage. She finally recognizes them as her team's colors, but right now they kind of make her sick. She lets her blinks last long, blocking them out.

"What happen?"

"Well.. after you lost consciousness, that man came back - the one who ran off - and just then a police car came, and he turned around and ran again. They're still looking for him. The driver tried to fight. He was shot and they're trying to stabilize him for transport," she gestures off to the side, and Jane looks to see a few EMT's buzzing around a gurney nearby. It's only then that she realizes she's also on a gurney. "It doesn't look good for him. Detectives Frost and Korsak got here a couple of minutes-"

Jane hears all the details, but they're so hard to hang onto. She reaches up to touch her girlfriend's cheek. Even though a concussion, that pink nose and those wet lashes are impossible to miss.

"You been cryin'."

Maura gives a small, tight smile, stroking over Jane's hairline. "I was so worried. Any brain injury has the potential..." She closes her eyes, shakes away the rest of the sentence, and squeezes Jane's hand again, hard. "But it's okay now. You're okay."

Korsak and Frost step into view on either side of her gurney.

"Hey, Jane," the older man greets. "How you feeling?"

"Good as I look," she grumbles, confident that the left side of her face is all the wrong sizes and colors. "Thanks for savin' our hides, guys," she says, knocking Frost's arm with her fist. "Hey, who'd I dial, anyway?"

"Me," Korsak answers. "But Fros-"

"_I_ tracked your GPS," Frost interrupts with a bragging smile. It's no shock; Korsak has great old-school detective instincts, but his grasp of technology tapers off somewhere around 1985.

Everyone's attention is then pulled off to one side, so Jane follows suit. The EMTs around the other man's gurney have been moving in a flurry, but now have slowed, as if their work is no longer urgent.

"He died," Maura whispers, still staring. "He died." Jane isn't exactly crushed by grief.

People are talking more, but Jane's distracted by the center of her brain feeling.. hollow. Dried out. Like there's cold air blowing on it, and she can't move out of the way. She visualizes dunking her head in a bucket of warm water and letting her brain soak it up.

_Maybe if I got a snorkel and a-_

"Jane?"

"Huh?"

"We're going now," Maura pats her arm. "I'll ride with you."

"Actually ma'am," a very young EMT holds up a hand to stop her, "there won't be room for anyone to ride."

He thinks she'd be in the way. Jane wants to laugh._ It's _you_ who'd be in _her_ way, you little shit._

Jane crooks her finger at him, and when he doesn't come close enough for her liking, she grasps his shirt and pulls him down slightly.

"I don't know if you know," she says quietly, conspiratorially, pointing towards Maura, "that's the Chief Common..." _No. Crap._ "The Massatussits..." She closes her eyes in frustration at herself. She's flubbing the impressiveness of Maura's title and making a fool of herself in front of this guy. This _kid_. "Somebody who could get you fired with one phone call. I mean, she's real nice, though, she probly wouldn't, just... y'know. Just makin' sure you knew who you're talking to." With her point made, she releases his shirt.

There's certainly still room in that ambulance for Maura. It's not that she's scared to be separated from her; it's just that she respects Maura's position and wants to make sure other people show some respect, too. She didn't spend five hundred years in medical school and get appointed Chief.. Whatever in order to have this high-school trainee refuse to bend a guideline for her.

"On the other hand, I guess it would be ok..." he nods uncomfortably, taking a step backwards.

"I'd appreciate it very much," Maura sends a fake but convincing warm smile at him, trying to smooth it over.

She doesn't like it when Jane throws her title around to threaten people's jobs, especially people who haven't done anything wrong. But her attempt to make a sour face at Jane is weak; she's clearly too glad to be climbing into the ambulance alongside her.

* * *

**A/N -**_ It actually is that easy to break out of a zip tie! I can't put the link here, so please search "how to break zip ties" on YouTube for the visual - there's a 1 minute video of a girl showing you what to do. It's very simple and could save you someday - I wish everyone reading would learn this!_**  
**

_Next we'll be heading home for some rest, tlc, and starting to figure out what the heck just happened._


	4. Couch Potato

_Thank you to everyone taking a moment to leave feedback, I really appreciate it :)_

___Here we are, picking up that same night. _

* * *

_Chapter Content: Should be pretty smooth sailing for a few chapters._

* * *

The hospital visit is a blur, partly because Jane is still woozy, but mostly because it's boring. She stares with abstract interest at her X-rays while Maura talks to the doctor with their doctor words. _W__ah-wah-wah_ like Charlie Brown's teacher.

Maura makes a phonecall and Hurricane Angela strikes only minutes later, bursting in and smothering her baby with love. Her voice hurts and makes Jane wince, but she knows it's no use asking her to talk quieter. The nurses share Jane's pain and struggle to keep finding new but still polite ways to ask Angela to calm down and step out of their way.

Jane certainly would have a more relaxed time with only Maura there, but supposes this cuts down on the level of insanity she would have walked into if she'd simply come home in bandages with no prior communication. Having Angela there also gives Maura a chance to step out a few times without feeling like she's leaving Jane alone.

Although they conclude that she has no rib or jaw fractures, Jane's still developing some nasty bruising and soreness in both places. She gets small bandages on a couple of scrapes, but thankfully none call for stitches (she'd been prepared to fight off the nurse and make Maura do it). The doctors and her mother collectively order Jane to at least a few days' bed rest for the sake of her concussion. Normally she would protest, but considering her favorite doctor makes house calls, this doesn't seem like such a terrible prospect.

Thanks to red tape and hospital bullshit, they aren't out until almost nine. Angela drives them home, since Maura's car is still at the garage downtown.

But then at home, when they're both exhausted and eager to finally be alone together, Angela is dead-set on cooking them an I'm-glad-you're-alive feast. She won't be dissuaded, even after they explain that they're too tired, and even after Jane grabs a banana out of the fruit bowl in exasperation, wolfs it down, hands her the peel, and declares herself fed. The only thing that works is when Maura pulls her aside to explain that Jane really needs to go upstairs for some quiet and rest now, and her voice runs dry and catches mid-sentence. Seeing her try so hard not to cry puts Angela into a gentler mode and, after another hug apiece, she grants them their space.

Despite Jane's insistence that she's basically fine, Maura tries to help her do every little thing once they get to the bedroom, including taking off her sneakers.

"Naw, c'mon, I got it," she says, pulling her foot out of Maura's hands, and tugs the laces out herself. "My arms are one thing I didn't hurt."

Maura sits back silently, subdued. She has been all day, understandably.

"Sure you're okay?" Jane asks for the twentieth time.

She nods, a little absently, before touching Jane's knee. "I am now. I was just really scared today."

Jane gives a sympathetic smile.

"I know, Maur. I was too. C'mere," she extends a hand to help her girlfriend off the floor and onto the bed. "I'm really sorry," she says after a minute.

"About what?"

"Letting it happen."

"You didn't _let_ anything happen," Maura frowns. "You fought. That's why you're hurt."

Jane closes her eyes instead of shaking her head, because that would make her dizzy.

"But they shouldn'a got us in the first place. I was screwing around, not paying enough attention. If I'd just moved a little faster..."

"Jane, I don't want to hear that," she says, in a tone that suggests she's been expecting it to come up. "It was all beyond your control. And here we are, both home safe and sound, thanks to you saving us as usual. So right now, I want you to put all that out of your mind, and get some rest," Maura says firmly, heading off what could be a very long discussion.

Jane lets out a sigh full of unresolved worries.

"I'm really glad_ you're_ alright," she adds, touching Jane's bruise lightly.

"I'll be okay, if you quit pokin' it," Jane says, shying away and then sliding an arm around Maura's shoulder. "I'm glad you're okay, too. And you did good, I forgot to say - or did I? Hittin' the guy, I mean. I don't remember if I said."

"I certainly didn't inflict much damage," Maura shrugs sullenly.

"Yeah, well, you're not the Hulk. But you sure stunned him, either way. I'm proud of you."

"Thanks." Maura smiles a little, glassy-eyed, leaning into the crook of Jane's neck. "You know I.. I couldn't wait for us to be home in bed, all wrapped up in a big... warm, safe, cozy ball together. I think of that sometimes, when I'm having a bad time... it helps."

"Big ball comin' right up," Jane promises with a smile. She gets into her pajamas while Maura steps into the bathroom to quickly wash and change.

In the darkness, Maura crawls into bed and curls immediately, tightly, against her side. And there it is. This is when the day is officially a success - no matter what awful events have filled it, the most important thing is that they can end it together, warm in each others' arms. It's home within home, the most home they can possibly be.

It's silent when she begins to cry, but Jane can feel it. She's been calm and professional all day long, but here and now, it's finally okay to let the facade crumble and admit that the day has taken a toll. Jane hates when Maura has to cry, but loves that her arms are always a place she feels safe to do it.

"We're safe, Maur," she whispers, nuzzling into her hair for a kiss. "It's over."

"I know."

Jane's head spins with flashes of fear and guilt and pain and anger and love.

She might have gotten shot today without being sure she'd ever have another chance to tell Maura she loves her.

_She already knows. And getting shot for somebody is a pretty big 'I love you' even if you don't get to say it. But still._

"Hey, did I tell you I love you today?" She's pretty sure she did, several times.

Maura nods against her neck.

"K. Well. I love you again."

The muffled reply takes a minute to compose.

"I lovey-you too, Jane."

Jane's head keeps spinning, slower and slower, until the sounds of Maura's crying seem a mile away.

* * *

"Janie? Are you awake?"

"_Mmrgh_. Am now," she groans.

"Good. It's time you ate something."

"Isnit early for breakfast?" she yawns.

"Nope, in fact, it's almost getting late for lunch," Angela informs her.

The closed curtains and lack of alarm have fooled her into thinking it was much earlier - she double-takes at the clock saying it's 1 in the afternoon.

Her mother places a tray over her lap with chicken soup and Tylenol.

"Maura said you need lots of sleep. Eat that, it's gonna get cold. I wanted to go get you one of those big burgers you like, but she said you'd have trouble eating it. How's your head, baby?"

"Thanks, Ma. It's..." she takes stock of herself, and shrugs. "It's a little better I guess, but I dunno, I just woke up." She stirs at the soup, seeing that there's still steam rising off the top. Her mother has always believed that soup loses its magical medicinal properties if not eaten while still scalding hot. She has to be careful not to wobble the tray too much or she'll have to go back to the hospital for 2nd degree burns. "Where _is_ Maura?"

"She's around," she shrugs. "She stayed in bed with you pretty late. I'll tell her you're up."

Still sleepy, Jane takes her time with the soup.

A glance in the bathroom mirror shows her cheekbone certainly is bruised, though not quite as badly as she expected. She washes up and makes her way downstairs to park herself on the couch.

The only one around to greet her downstairs is Jo Friday. Hanging one arm off the couch, she plays a halfhearted game of tug-o-war with her until Maura appears at her side a minute later.

"Jane! How are you feeling?" Maura kisses her good morning (afternoon).

"Hey. Little sore, but okay."

"Good. I'm glad you got a lot of sleep."

"Yea-" Jo jumps up on the couch, stepping right on Jane's ribs. "OOf- ow! No, Jo, ow," she pushes the dog back. "Jeez. Stay there, okay?"

Unbothered, Jo curls up with her head on Jane's leg. It's hard to stay annoyed with her when she does that.

"Let me see," Maura says, lifting up Jane's shirt to reveal a bruised area about the size of her palm. She feels it gingerly. "Inflammation isn't any worse... are you having a lot of pain?"

"Nah," Jane shrugs. Those muscles do hurt when she moves them, and her head still feels weird in a sleepy sort of way, but, "I've had lots worse. Hey, aren't you gonna ask me how many fingers you're holding up and what year it is?"

Maura patronizingly holds up three fingers.

"Six."

She cocks her head in concern.

"Oh m- joke, Maura. Don't worry so much. I know it's three, and 1997. Relax."

...

"_Joke._ Maura."

She isn't amused.

"Well, I see your sense of humor is intact. That's good. Healthwise," she adds dryly. "Let me get you some ice."

"I didn't give a statement last night, did I?" Jane rubs at her face, trying to recall.

"I insisted you were in no condition to give a formal statement, but you did keep repeating everything you could remember - which I agreed sounded complete - so they may be satisfied with that for now," Maura answers, crossing the kitchen and opening the freezer. "I'm sure you already have it somewhere, but Detective Andrews left his number for you, if you wanted to clarify anything. He said you could call if you didn't feel up to meeting."

"Andrews?" Jane frowns. He's another homicide detective at BPD, not one that she particularly likes. "Wait, why's homicide looking at a kidnapping?"

"Well.. I don't remember how much you remember of the discussion... the parking structure where we were taken is next to a bank. The officers' theory was that they might have intended to take me over there to withdraw money. I suppose they knew where I had an account from looking at my credit cards."

"Uh-huh?"

"But when they found us yesterday, they also found a body just beyond the far end of the parking structure. I didn't examine him closely, but it looked like he'd been shot very recently. Within the hour."

"Same time we were there?" Jane's brows rise. "Wait- that one guy ran off..."

Maura nods.

"Did you hear a shot?"

"I think I heard something that could have been a gunshot just after you lost consciousness," Maura says, closing her eyes for a moment. "It's difficult to remember clearly.. I was rather distracted at the time."

"Yeah, but I mean, if you said the uniforms got there right when I got knocked out, didn't _they_ hear it, too?"

"No, I-I didn't say that. They arrived soon, but not simultaneously... several moments." She remembers she's still standing there beside the couch, fidgeting with the ice pack, and applies it to Jane's side. "That would have been before they arrived. But they're operating on the assumption that the murder and kidnapping are connected, which is why neither you nor I can have anything to do with the investigation."

"You mean you're not gonna do the aut-" Jane's face passes from irritation to a pained scowl. "Please not Dr. Pike?"

Maura nods.

"I understand if _I'm_ not allowed, but why not you? You're the chief, isn't it your call?"

"My call is that I don't want to be the reason for any evidence getting tossed out. You know how any personal connection can jeopardize a case. "

"Dr. Pike can jeopardize it lots worse," Jane grumbles. "Wait, how come nobody told me this yesterday?"

"You weren't quite yourself yesterday. I'd prefer not to have told you that today, either - I wish you wouldn't think about it too much. It's essential that you have mental as well as physical rest. But I was worried you'd be angry that I kept it from you, and I'm sure you'd rather hear it from me than Detective Andrews."

"Damn straight."

"Are you?" Maura asks, looking anxious. "Angry? That I didn't tell you sooner?"

Jane shrugs. "No. I just don't like people keeping stuff from me like I'm some dumb kid."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean... I.. just didn't want to trouble you when there was nothing you could even do about it."

"I know. S'alright." Maura's right, but Jane still wishes somebody had mentioned it to her, just out of respect if nothing else. "Anyway. How're you doing?"

Maura sits at the end of the couch just beyond Jane's socked feet.

"I think it's safe to say I'll survive," she assures with a small smile, petting Jo Friday.

* * *

Jane is thoroughly babied for the rest of the day and, come Monday morning, she has mixed feelings about staying home. On one hand, she feels bad to see Maura and Angela going out into the world to be useful while she just sits around. But on the other hand, it feels like staying home sick from school, and unlike when she was a kid, she's actually left home all alone. Even though she's lived on her own for the latter half of her life, there's somehow a fun sort of novelty in it.

This is the first time Maura's left the house since the kidnapping, and Jane really hates not to be going with her (not that she's currently feeling very proud of her protective abilities, after what happened). Secretly, she asks Frankie to 'happen to stop by' for an imaginary errand, providing an unofficial police escort in her stead.

The way her mother fusses on her way out, Jane almost expects to be left a notepad with instructions on how to call 911 and warned not to open the door for strangers. Similarly, Maura makes her promise three times that she'll stay put and rest the whole time they're gone. Just on principle, Jane is tempted to get up as soon as they leave and dance naked through the house or something.

The most she ends up doing is making herself some popcorn and stretching back out on the couch, excited to finally check out one of the action movies she's had queued forever but never gets to watch because Maura doesn't like them. Unfortunately, the movie is a letdown and she ends up fast-forwarding more than half of it, and then after floating around the channels for a while and finding nothing very interesting, she allows herself to doze off.

When she opens her eyes, she's startled to realize she's already holding someone else's gaze.

"Can I... help you?"

Bass sits only a few feet away, staring at her. Or maybe just staring in general. She's never sure if he's asking for something when he comes near, or if he just coincidentally happens to drift by sometimes, like some glacial screensaver bouncing at random around the house.

"You want something?"

"How'd you get over here so quiet? You know, you wake me up all the way upstairs at night, scrapin' around the floor down here, how come you're all in stealth mode now?"

He doesn't blink.

"... you are _alive_, right?"

She reaches out and pats the edge of his shell, satisfied that he is indeed alive when he pulls his head in.

"You ever gonna learn that I'm not trying to chop your head off every time I pet you?" she sighs.

"Let's see what they left us," she says, sitting up and leaning to reach the coffee table, which is stocked with her phone and laptop plus enough books, newspapers, painkillers, ice packs, drinks, and snacks to keep her fed and entertained for a week. "Sheesh. What, no coloring books?"

All the snacks are healthier than she'd prefer. She picks up a small bowl of blueberries.

"I think I've made it pretty clear that I hate blueberries, so I'm gonna assume these are for you," she says, choosing one and placing it on the floor near Bass. He makes no move to suggest he even sees it.

"There." She points. "There. See it?"

"Gotta tell you, buddy, you're no fun at all. Like, not even a little bit."

After spacing out on the TV for a while, she looks back to find him in the identical position, but the blueberry is gone.

"How do you _do_ that?"

"Freakin' ninja turtle," she mumbles, rolling over and closing her eyes.

* * *

_A/N - An "injured Jane and Bass" scene is just a fandom requirement, okay._


	5. Back To Work

_Chapters like this are where it's going to be maybe glaringly evident that I'm not bothering to flesh out little homicide cases for them as busywork. But let's face it, no one cares about that, so let's all just agree that I'm sparing you a lot of weak filler, okay? Okay!_

* * *

It's past 10 at night and Jane leans in the doorway of Maura's home office, watching the doctor work. Leafing through a file at her desk, tapping something into her laptop keyboard, writing down the occasional note on her yellow pad. Even though she moves casually, calmly, something about the way her eyes focus on things just looks so incredibly _official_ - whatever she's looking into, she's thoroughly getting to the bottom of it, missing nothing. Jane can practically hear her supercomputer of a brain whirring.

"Whatcha workin' on?"

Maura is clearly startled; she regrets it.

"Oh. I just brought home some old paperwork to clear up a bit of the backlog."

"Hm."

Jane stands there as she continues working silently, distinctly wishing Maura would close that folder and come to bed with her. She doesn't necessarily even want sex; she really just wants the comforting warmth of her favorite person resting next to her. But, they don't have to be together _every_ single moment they're home. As much as they love each others' company, they still have their individual lives and careers, and Jane respects Maura's work too much to interrupt her like a child demanding attention. (Usually.)

"Well. I'm pretty beat, guess I'm gonna go to bed.."

"Okay. I'll be in before long, I just want to tie up a couple of loose ends," Maura says distractedly, tapping her keyboard, clearly trying not to lose a train of thought.

Jane slips her hand silently from the door frame and goes to climb into bed alone, deciding to stay awake until her girlfriend joins her. Even though her head is feeling pretty much normal now, a little extra drowsiness is a lingering symptom; her body wants all the sleep it can get in order to repair itself. Or so Maura says.

When she rolls over hoping for a kiss goodnight, it's stark bright morning and Maura has already come and gone. Her hand plops down in disappointment onto the still-warm indentation in the sheets at her side.

She lies on her back and listens to the shower running through the bathroom wall and tallies that as a night she'll never get back. Even if they live to be ancient, and she has many many many many many more nights to feel Maura fall asleep in her arms, the number isn't infinite. There's a total, set in stone in the heavens somewhere. And she just let one slip through her fingers.

Having a job that revolves so prominently around death - including the risk of her own - Jane thinks about things like that a lot. It makes her melancholy.

Before they leave for work this morning, she will hug Maura very hard and very long and not explain why.

* * *

Though slobbing around the house has had its perks, Jane is glad to walk back into the bullpen and get to work. Fortunately, the days she's missed have been pretty slow, so she doesn't have too much trouble getting caught up.

This return comes with at least ten warnings from Maura that she's still not allowed to do anything strenuous for another week or two - warnings she's willing to bend, if not totally disregard.

When she keeps hearing the faint buzzes of both her partners' phones, she looks up in time to catch them exchanging a glance.

"Uh. Korsak," Frost says, "The.. thing we were talking about. I found out where it is."

"Okay," Korsak says, standing immediately, like he's spring-loaded.

"You two need some alone time, or?" Jane stares over her monitor with a skeptically furrowed brow.

"Frost, uh, just wants to show me something." Another awkward glance. "Shouldn't take long."

"Okay, this is literally _the_ worst cover-up attempt I have ever witnessed. Why don't you just tell me what it is that I'm not invited to right now?"

Frost sighs, knowing it's pointless.

"We got a suspect on the move in Dorchester."

"Jane," Korsak says, motioning for her to stay put as she starts to get up, "Why don't you keep doing what you're doing, there's no need for all three of us to go."

"What? No, I'm going."

"Nah, he's right," Frost says. "Really, we got this."

"Guys, I'm fine. Good as new. Since when do you try to keep me at my desk, anyway?" Jane frowns. This isn't the first time she's worked while recovering from injuries, and Frost in particular has always been on her side when she insists she's well enough to fudge a little medical advice.

She gasps as the explanation hits her, and points a finger accusingly at both of them.

"She called you, didn't she. She went behind my back and made you both promise not to let me go out."

Her partners exchange an uncomfortable glance.

"The doc's just looking out for you, Jane."

"She said if you get hurt again before you're done healing, it could be really serious," Korsak explains with a defensive shrug.

"I know, she told me that. About six hundred times. She doesn't trust me to stay here."

"Nobody who's known you longer than five minutes would," Frost smirks.

"The idea is that I came back to be useful again," she grumbles. "If I'd known I was really gonna get benched, I could have stayed home."

"C'mon Jane, just for this week. You can get in the doghouse all you want on your own time, but don't drag us in there too," Frost urges with a smile. "Besides, if you get hit again, your whole head could just _explode_," he makes a bursting motion with his hands. "And that would suck, cause Frankie might get your desk, and he's even worse about stealing my food than you are."

"That is touching."

"Course it's not your favorite part of the job, but you know the desk stuff is just as useful," Korsak reasons, grabbing his badge. "We've still got a whole list of background checks to run on this case, one of us _is_ gonna have to do that. It really is faster if we split up."

"Alright," Jane answers glumly, swinging her arm in a shooing motion towards the door. "Go on then, don't lose your suspect."

After 20 more minutes of quiet work, she hits a wall. Maybe her brain isn't quite up to full power, or maybe Maura's warnings just gave her that idea.

She thinks of another case she'd rather check in on.

"How's it coming, Andrews?" She plops into the chair beside his desk.

Detective Andrews is a humorless, skinny, fiftyish salt-and-pepper type. Jane's never had much to do with him, but their few interactions have left her with an impression somewhere between neutral and annoyed. Maybe it's just because of the way his teeth whistle when he says his S's.

Right now, she has a new reason to dislike him: the system feels ass-backwards and she hates that she can't work her own case. She hates playing the victim instead of the investigator. (Cavanaugh knows this, and that is why he'd welcomed her back this morning by preemptively scolding her about staying out of the way.)

Andrews takes a moment to regard her, reading the slight challenge in her tone and body language, deciding that this is the way it's going to be.

"Good to see you back," he says, looking at his computer screen. His welcome is free of warmth, although there is no reason it should have contained any. "There are a couple of details to discuss... let's get right to it."

_No, please, let's gossip for a while first._

"One of your kidnappers was killed on the scene."

"I know. I was there." She says in monotone, crossing her leg.

"Ah. Well.. you were a little out of it," he says, making a few clicks on his computer and twisting his monitor around so Jane can see a photo of a dark-haired man. "Antonio Petrone. Familiar to you?"

"Doesn't ring any bells," she shakes her head.

"He has a handful of charges on his record... mostly out of state.. burglaries... small time charges. Detective, I don't see anything yet that suggests this was more than random," he looks at her over the top of his glasses. He probably doesn't intend it, but his demeanor makes this conversation feel like she's getting lectured by somebody's dad.

"I'm not thinking it wasn't... but I do keep wondering why they picked us in the first place. I mean, if you're cruising around looking for somebody to grab, you'd go for an easy target. Somebody alone, distracted, quiet, rich enough to be worth the trouble. Maura alone, sure. But two people, that's risky. Especially when they had nothing apparently to do with the other one?"

She wonders if she detects a tiny hint of a patronizing smile on his face, like _don't try to work my case for me._

"Perhaps they intended to extort money from you, when they were done doing so with her."

She shrugs. It's possible.

He pulls up another picture. "Richard Bankstein. He's the one found shot to death near your scene. Familiar?"

The man in this picture is probably 40, balding.. nothing special, nothing familiar.

"No."

Though she knows Det. Andrews is her ally, she catches herself using the most challenging tone so far when she asks him,

"And how're you coming with the one that got away?"

He shifts in his seat. She gets the sense that he understands her agitation, even if neither of them are addressing it.

"My brightest point right now is that that garage is equipped for surveillance. We're having a little snafu with the warrant. But it'll work out."

"Hope so."

* * *

Later, Jane takes a time-out to go down to the morgue and see Maura, who's in the middle of an autopsy. Fortunately, she's already missed Dr. Pike by a whole day.

"Hey, when you finish up here, I wanna take you out for a drink with the boys, for bein' such a badass." She intentionally gives Maura one of the compliments she always seems to be striving for - an elusive one, because frankly, Maura isn't often badass - but it's not received with as much excitement as she expected.

"That's nice, Jane, but I don't really feel like it today. You go, though. Oh- but I'd rather you didn't consume any alcohol quite yet. You're still healing."

"Well, you were kinda the point," Jane deflates. "No you _and_ no booze, that's no fun. C'mon, you earned free drinks and a captive audience for storytelling."

"I'm not interested in storytelling," Maura answers a little more firmly. Then she closes her eyes, like maybe she considered that an outburst. "Sorry. I appreciate the intent, it's just that.. while I'm certainly grateful we both survived, I still didn't _enjoy_ the experience, I wouldn't enjoy telling stories."

"Oh. Okay." Jane puts her hands in her pockets.

_She's not the same as you. When are you going to learn? _

"I'd still buy you a drink and we can talk about..." she glances at what's in Maura's hands, "..intestines, instead," she jokes. Maura's face doesn't react, and it's probably one more step in the wrong direction. "Or not. Um. Okay. Well. I'll wait for you in the cafe later, k?" She wants them to leave work at the same time.

Maura hums her consent, extremely focused on making a delicate incision into some glistening pinkish object. Jane decides not to distract her any further.

She's relieved when they finally curl up together on the couch that evening. Clinking her root beer bottle against a generous glass of red wine, she toasts Maura briefly on a job well done.

* * *

She recognizes those little twitches and sharp breaths. The way she's asleep one second, and intensely surveying the bedroom the next.

Jane has had enough nightmares to know when Maura's having one. This is the third night it's happened in the past week.

"Hey, you alright?" she asks gently, sitting up on one elbow.

"M-hm." The reply is shaky. "Sorry I disturbed you."

"You didn't."

Jane recalls Maura saying once that she doesn't seem to have the bizarre, fantastic dreams that other people report - hers are mostly only reruns of true events. With that in mind, it's not hard to guess what recent event is on her mind. She wonders if Maura is worrying about the man who's still unaccounted for. But in case not, she decides not to introduce a new worry by bringing it up.

She's still sitting up in bed, silent and still. Jane reaches over to rub her back lightly, comfortingly.

"It's been a while since my last kidnapping," Maura says, in an attempted tone of nervous laughter. "I suppose I'm still not as accustomed to danger as you are."

"You shouldn't have to be accustomed to it at all."

Of course it had been frightening, but it ended pretty quickly, and here they both are, safe and sound. Jane hasn't had any dreams about it. It's not that she's _accustomed_ to danger, but she's been through plenty of much worse situations. In fact, her head injury has brought back some fleeting memories of Hoyt; if she were going to have a nightmare, it would more likely be about that.

Maybe Maura has taken all of their unpleasant events harder than she ever realized, and this is merely the first time Jane's ever been around to fully witness her reaction. Now she feels a little guilty. If she'd known Maura was that much more sensitive, she would have reached out more, comforted her more, invited her to sleep over more.

Jane remembers the bad nights alone in her apartment. Maura was always willing to come over or talk to her on the phone at any hour - although she only called her on a small handful of the worst times, not wanting to bother her too often.

She remembers the nightlight she kept plugged in the wall, just in case, even when she didn't use it for weeks or months at a time. It's still in the box from when she moved in; she hasn't even thought of it until now.

"Hey, I know something that might help a little bit," Jane says, clicking on her lamp and slipping out of bed. She goes to pick through a cardboard box in her closet - well, her _half_ of one of Maura's closets. They're huge, and half of one is all she needs for her stuff, and the doctor's extensive wardrobe certainly makes use of the excess space. She finds her nightlight, plugs it in, and switches the lamp back off when she gets in bed.

"So you can see there's nobody here but us chickens," she smiles in the remaining dim light. "Used to help me."

"Thank you," Maura says quietly. "... What else used to help?"

"Well... sometimes if it was especially bad, I used to call this really smart friend of mine. She'd help me every time."

"What did she say?"

"Oh, she'd tell me about all sorts of stuff I could try. Like, go play with Jo, get a glass of water and meditate, listen to music.. read a book... any of that sound good? You wanna play with the dog?"

"I'm sure she's sleeping..."

"Wanna play with the turtle?"

"He wouldn't be very responsive at this hour, either."

_... ? Sheesh, she must be tired._

"Wanna play with the detective?" she offers. "Gin rummy? Or we could watch somethin' dumb on Netflix?"

Maura touches her hand, and seems to ponder for a moment.

"What kind of activity was most effective for you?"

"Don't tell, but most of the time I never really did the activities she said," Jane yawns. "What helped was just hearin' her voice while she explained."

"Hm. I think I know a girl like that."

"Want me to read you a bedtime story, then?" Jane asks, beginning the sentence jokingly but really offering by the end. "How about- what's that on your nightstand? Lemme put the lamp back on-"

"Oh. No! Wait, don't turn it on," Maura says, handing her the thin journal. "This would be a perfect use for my new reading light."

"... What?"

"It just came today."

Jane hears the nightstand drawer open and shut and then with another click, she flinches away from a small but blinding LED light. Maura hands it to her - a tiny gooseneck light attached to a clamp.

"Perfect," Jane squints in pain. _Remember to cancel her subscription to Skymall in the morning._

Maura nestles back into her usual spot against her shoulder, and takes a deep breath to calm herself. Jane pulls the comforter over them both and gets comfortable, slipping an arm around her.

"Actually, here, you better cover up," she says, pulling the sheet up even farther, right over Maura's face. "You stare at this light, you'll never sleep again."

"Thanks," says the sheet, sounding slightly amused.

She finally takes a look at the cover of what Maura's handed her.

"'Genes, Brain and Behavior.' Oh, wow. Settle in, this'll put you down like a glass of warm milk."

"The effectiveness of warm milk as a sleep inducer is likely due solely to its comforting psychological associations," explains a quiet and slightly muffled voice.

"Even better, then." Jane opens to the bookmark and clips her light to the top of the journal.

"Okay. The catechol..o..methyl...transfer..ase? Oh God, that's only the second word. Seriously? Polymorphism-" -the sheet next to her giggles- "-influences the enzyme activity of... C-O-M-T? Which affects the prefrontal... dopamine concentration? Is this... do you even remember what this article is about?" She flips a couple of pages back until she sees a title. "'On the genetic basis of face cognition and its relation to fluid cognitive abilities.' Uh. That doesn't.. okay."

"I remember," Maura assures. "Go on."

Although she uses 'genius' as merely an affectionate nickname for Maura, reading material this awful gives Jane an appreciation for what an actual genius she really must be. There is hard work involved in knowing the answer to every question.

But she figures Maura may not really be paying much attention right now - she just wants to hear her, so she doesn't worry about the many pronunciations she must be butchering. The end of the article is nowhere in sight, so she just reads until her voice goes dry.

"A single-nucleotide polymorphism is located in the promoter region of the oxytocin receptor gene... by modeling a general fluid ability factor, it was determined that Maura Isles has fallen asleep," she rasps quietly.

There is no disagreement.

She clicks off the light and gingerly sets the journal aside, next to her gun on the nightstand.

Carefully removing the sheet from Maura's head, she smiles at her sleeping face for a moment in the dim light, and kisses her temple very softly.

* * *

_A/N - __ btw, that is a real (real boring) article from that journal. Ugh. How do you smart?_

_That final scene is a sorta-reference to my first R&I fic, Right Here On The Hardwood Floor, which is a oneshot with Maura comforting Jane after a nightmare. I didn't specifically intend that to be in the same universe as this back then, but it does fit. If you feel like a little background/extra credit reading, you might check that out. _

_Thanks for following along. Feedback always appreciated! :)_


	6. Not Tonight

Gun in hand, Jane squints suspiciously at the distorted shape of the unfamiliar UPS guy through the peep hole, waiting for someone to sign for a package. She almost wishes Giovanni still made deliveries. He may be a skeeze, but at least he's a skeeze she can vouch for.

"Who's that?" Maura asks quietly, having come to the sound of the doorbell.

"UPS. Could you go in the other room?" Jane whispers.

"Why?"

"Just in case."

"Jane, I'm expect-"

"I know, but just, please?"

Maura sighs and disappears up the stairs.

Jane's guard is up sky-high lately when it comes to opening their home to anyone she doesn't know. Opening the door with her gun already pointed at him would probably be overkill, so she settles for putting on her holster just for the moment.

She opens the door and signs, all the while sending every possible body language vibe to say _I am fully prepared to crush your skull_. A little warily, the UPS guy hands her a largish box and retreats without incident.

"All clear," she calls out after locking the door, and Maura immediately comes back down the stairs to take the box.

"Are you hauling heat around the house, now?" she asks.

"Wh-? _Packing._ It's 'packing heat,'" she snorts. "And no. Don't wanna have to walk around my own house like some old-west gunslinger." Although sometimes she's tempted to just wear her gun, instead of having to remember to carry it from room to room.

She watches as Maura open up the box and pull out a mass of navy blue colored fabric.

"You bought a blanket?"

"No..." Maura unfurls the whole thing, draping it in front of herself. It has sleeves..?

"Oh... no. Wow. Please tell me you're going to some kinda Druid ceremony, and not that you just bought a Slanket."

"I did not! .. buy.. _a_ Slanket."

Jane exhales heavily, closing her eyes.

"What color is mine."

"Red!" Maura answers cheerfully, reaching back into the box. "You know, Red _Sox..._"

Jane bites her lips.

_So cute. So awful._

* * *

When Jane comes looking for Maura the next afternoon, she can't be found in the cafe, morgue or office, so Jane tries the next most likely place - that tiny 2-stall bathroom around the corner from the morgue that hardly anyone seems to know about.

Pushing the door open, she immediately sees her girlfriend standing there in front of the sink mirror, dabbing some white cream on her neck with her pinkie.

"Oh, hi," she says, brightly, meeting Jane's eyes in the reflection.

"Hey." Jane frowns. It's been several days since Maura wore anything very low-cut, and apparently it's because her neck is still bothering her. "Still?"

"The irritation can take several days to fade completely.. depending on severity and treatment.." she answers, still dabbing.

Jane's about to teasingly ask whether she's been telling lies, but decides to go easy. She already knows that it's stress in general, not just dishonesty, that gives Maura hives - and if being kidnapped at gunpoint isn't a form of stress that can stick with you for a while, she doesn't know what is.

"Did you need something?" Maura adds.

Jane shrugs, "Well, we kind of fizzled out on our end, so I came down to see if you had anything on the victim yet."

"You know I'd have texted you if I did."

"Yeah. Well... I like comin' down here just to bug you, too," she smirks.

Feeling extra protective, she's been coming to visit even more frequently than usual, not even bothering with a pretense half the time. Plus, this is one of those days where she just can't keep her thoughts off Maura - and now her eyes, either. She wonders how Maura's still that attractive while making sort of a monkey face to stretch her neck taut.

Jane glances around a little mischievously, noting the isolation of this bathroom, and the lock on the door, but it's tempered by the knowledge that they're both too professional - and she probably too prudish - to ever really take advantage of it.

She debates whether one nice, deep kiss would be okay, or if it would trigger an avalanche of sensations that would make the rest of her workday difficult. Maura catches her slightly hungry smile in the mirror just before her lab coat pocket buzzes, and she pulls out a text from Susie Chang.

"Oh. We have test results."

"Good timing," Jane sighs a little grumpily, holding the door open for Maura with her foot.

Even though she's glad to spend the rest of the day successfully wrapping up a case thanks to that evidence, not many minutes of it pass where she doesn't find herself warm with thoughts of smooth skin and wet kisses.

By the time she watches Maura slide into bed next to her that night, her mouth is practically watering.

Wordlessly, she leans close and begins planting soft kisses around Maura's cheek, her temple, her brow. It's their usual precursor to lovemaking, and she can get positively drunk on this alone. Because no matter how much she's looking forward to the intense, passionate kisses, she means these little ones.

Maura returns a nuzzle, but then angles her face slightly down from Jane's kisses for just a second. It's how she says _not tonight._ Jane waits a second to receive the consolation prize of an apologetic kiss on her cheek, assuring her it's not due to lack of love.

Aching, Jane's disappointed, but never pushes. She touches one final kiss to Maura's forehead, to say _that's okay_, before settling at her side and lifting an arm for Maura to slip underneath. That invitation, she accepts.

This same sequence has happened on a few nights now. And that's fine; their lovemaking has always been about quality, not quantity, so neither really minds waiting until the right planets align. They've gone this long before. As long as her shoulder is still the place Maura wants to rest her head each night, she's happy.

"Night, Maur."

The breath is warm against her collarbone, the arm tight around her middle. "Goodnight, Jane."

* * *

"Find heroin?"

Maura continues staring at the printout in her hand.

These results hold pivotal clues about a very frustrating case, and everyone upstairs has been dying for a break just so they can know how to begin their investigation. Jane has little patience for being kept in any more suspense.

"..Maura?"

"Yes?"

"You did?"

"I did what?"

"_Find heroin_ in our vic," Jane nods toward the printout like she's crazy. "What, was there so much that you're trippin' out just reading the results?" She tilts the papers in Maura's hand towards herself, as if she'll suddenly be able to interpret the little percentages and measurements and chemicals faster than waiting for the doctor's explanation, but as usual, it might as well be in Japanese.

"Oh- sorry- no, our... our stabbing victim had no heroin in his system... or anything else of note, for that matter..." She flips to the next page and back, looking confused.

"What is it?" Jane frowns.

"It just- the results aren't.. what I expected to see," she adds.

"Why, Dr. Isles, have you been _guessing_?" Jane raises an eyebrow smugly.

Maura doesn't seem to appreciate or even acknowledge the tease, so she drops it.

If it weren't Friday anyway, she'd suggest that Maura ought to take a day off. She's seemed alternately too tense and too mellow lately, and still not sleeping well all the time; Jane's sure a little time to unwind would do her good. It'd be nice to think of something relaxing to do this weekend. Maybe - _ugh_ - she could even take Maura to one of those stupid spa things.

But right now, she has to focus on work.

"Huh. Well, that kinda sinks my theory," Jane sighs with disappointment, her mind delving into alternate possibilities about this murder. She checks a buzz from her phone. "Gotta go run this by the guys, I'll catch you later."

Back upstairs, Jane, Frost and Korsak spend a few more tedious hours trying to crack the case, but there's nothing but bad luck and dead ends until finally the workday is over. Hopefully they'll return on Monday and get a fresh jump on this case, but for now, she's more than ready to clock out, get home, and relax.

Checking her inbox one last time before closing up, Jane finds an email from Det. Andrews. He hasn't been at his desk most of the day, and Jane tires to believe that means he's out working hard to catch their remaining kidnapper. It's been two weeks now, and the trail isn't exactly getting warmer.

_Det. Rizzoli,_

_You'll be pleased to know that the garage surveillance has yielded useful information. Although the murder did not occur in view of any cameras, footage showing a physical altercation between the victim and your kidnapper was recorded. His mask was removed during the struggle and facial recognition software was able to suggest a suspect, though not with high certainty because the video quality is poor._

_I have attached a photo of our primary suspect, Kevin Dargan, along with the clearest frame from the video, as I'm sure you will be interested. Please ensure that neither of us regrets my decision to leave this information in your care._

_Det. Robert Andrews_

She's pissed at that last part, but she supposes it's sort of justified, considering how badly she's itching to send this info to Frost so they can hurry up and hunt this guy down themselves. Cavanaugh will rake her over the coals if she so much as runs the name Dargan on her computer, and Andrews would probably hear about it, too. Actually, she's appreciative that he gave her these pictures to keep instead of just showing them to her. It was more than she expected of him.

The photo labelled Dargan shows a young, sandy Irish-ish guy, with little beady blue eyes and a nose that looks like it's been broken a dozen times. Just as promised, the video frame is crap. It certainly _could_ be him, though honestly, she can't confirm that the man she remembers, and the man in the pictures aren't actually two (or three) different people. She would only be totally sure if she could look into his eyes again in person.

She sends back a quick reply and thanks, glad to have information to share with Maura when she goes home.

"TGIF," Frost mutters, stacking his papers and folders into a neat pile, as Jane pulls her blazer off the back of her chair. "I see an ice cold beer with my name on it. Wanna grab one?"

"Thanks, that sounds pretty good, but I wanna get home."

"Gotcha." He shoots her a small, sly smile. That's not what she meant, but there's no real point in correcting him.

"Frost, Rizzoli," their names accompany Cavanaugh's authoritative footsteps into the bullpen.

Jane gulps. _How did he know already? I didn't even do anything!_

"The D.A. is moving forward with the Whitmore case. Top priority. I need all your paperwork wrapped up ASAP. That means before you leave, unless you want to come in tomorrow."

"Yes, Sir," Frost nods, shooting Jane a look as Cavanaugh walks away.

She groans, watching her computer just finishing shutting down.

"Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted. I wanted to stay here all night and dig up paperwork an old case. You jinxed it," she scolds her partner.

"No way am I volunteering to come in on a Saturday, though," Frost shakes his head.

"Me neither," she sighs in agreement, dropping her blazer back over her chair.

While she waits for her computer to start back up, she sends her girlfriend a quick text to let her know what's going on. [ I'm SAW another couple hours. ]

Whichever one of them gets done with work first will usually come meet the other, or wait in the cafe so they can leave sort-of-together. She's not very comfortable with the thought of Maura driving home unescorted, but this is going to be too long of a gap to expect her to hang around.

Her phone buzzes in a few moments. [ Sorry. I'll see you at home then. ]

[ Be safe. ] She adds, as she tends to just a bit more often lately, [ Love you. ]

* * *

_A/N - __I just really wanted to get in a remote crotchblock from Susie. _

_I don't know whether I'm fully convinced that canon Maura would really buy a Slanket, but the mental image is so ridiculous that I couldn't resist. What do you think? Maybe the a__l fresco tray lunch pants were the gateway drug._  


_Thanks for sticking with me so far - I promise the next chapter will be a game changer. Feedback makes my little heart go pitter-pat ;)_


	7. In Those Moments

_Chapter Content: We are now entering the angst sector. Tw for rape (again, no graphic descriptions) and generally emotional difficulty._

* * *

_"Freeedom,"_ Jane groans when she walks in the door, exactly three hours later than she'd planned to get home.

She drops her keys on the kitchen island.

The house is silent.

"Hey, I'm home," She calls out loudly. "Maur?"

A small "hi" from the couch startles her.

"Oh, hey," she turns, stretching her back. "Sorry I'm so late. Cavanaugh threw a bunch of paperwork at me right as I was heading out the door. Oh, I didn't hear back from you about if you wanted me to bring home some dinner, did you eat?" she takes a whiff. The air is blank.

"No."

"K, I could go pick up.." she starts to offer, but as she steps closer, expecting to see a journal or tablet in Maura's lap that is holding her attention, she sees that there is nothing. "You alright?"

"I need to talk to you," Maura says quietly to her lap.

"Uh-oh, who do I gotta kill?" Jane plops down next to her.

"What?" Maura finally looks up at her, quickly. Though she isn't currently crying, she obviously has been recently.

The smile falls off Jane's face.

"Hey, whoa, what's the matter?" She presses a palm to Maura's back.

Jane doesn't remember there being a clock in the living room, but she can hear one ticking in the silence while Maura studies her face.

"You're..." The blonde swallows, pauses, and resumes staring at her own knees. "You love me. Quite a lot, I think, don't you?"

Jane feels her eyebrows crawl up her forehead. "Yes?" It shouldn't have sounded like a question. "Yes. Yeah. Course I do."

Maura blinks a long blink, like that answer is something to be clasped to her heart and savored. "I know you do."

"Good..." Lost, Jane nods slowly, and her eyes flit around the room as if she can find clues about what's happening scattered among the decor.

The silent hole usually occupied by _'I love you, too'_ is so loud.

"Are you breaking up with me?" Jane asks, kidding, until she feels a stab of panic.

Possible grounds for breakup start to whiz through her mind, but to her immense relief, Maura shakes her head.

"Oh. Good. Then is this about the wine stain on the couch cushion? Cause I wasn't tryin' to hide it, I just turned it over so nobody..." she says, trying to lighten the mood, but the joke is running too long and Maura isn't smiling.

It takes a few more silent moments before she dips her head, and does that thing she does with her lips when she's trying not to cry.

"Hey, I didn't- c'mere, c'mere," Jane offers her arms, and is relieved that Maura fills them. "Sorry, I'll shut up. You can tell me."

Maura isn't crying, but her breath cannot be trusted; she can't speak any full word before stopping to compose herself.

"Alright," Jane quiets her, with a soft flutter of pats on the shoulder blade. "Don't worry about talking then, okay? Just breathe. We'll just sit awhile. It's okay. You talk whenever you feel like it. Got all night," she assures.

Despite her (often-accurate) reputation as the most cranky, impatient person on Earth, Jane can actually be incredibly patient when it counts. With each silent minute that passes, she grows more worried; it's unlike Maura to have this much trouble talking about something. But she isn't going to rush. She'll hold her all day and night, if that's what helps.

"Okay," Maura finally musters a deep breath, pulling back to her own space. "See, there's something that you... I'm just... feeling kind of overwhelmed and I could really use.."

Ends of sentences are so much harder to come by than beginnings.

"Whatever's goin' on, you got me in your corner, alright?" Jane murmurs, her voice quiet but strong, promising, like stretching a net underneath Maura to catch her safely when she jumps. She rubs slow circles on her back.

Maura blinks long and nods.

"This about the kidnapping?"

Nod.

"I know you've seemed a little.. quiet, lately. Sorry it's bothering you so much. Actually, I just got some news from Detec..." she stops, seeing Maura shake her head slightly. That isn't the conversation she wants right now.

With no clue where to go from that, she just sets a hand on Maura's knee and moves the other slowly around the small of her back. Waiting patiently for direction.

Maura straightens after another long pause. She takes a breath. Composes herself. Addresses the coffee table.

"Did you know that a 'moment' was originally used in medieval times as a specific measurement equating to one fortieth of an hour?"

Jane stares back blankly. She doesn't know what she was expecting, but that wasn't it.

"Uh.. no. I didn't."

"That's ninety seconds."

"Hm... good to know."

_Stalling with some fun facts. Okay, sure._

_Moments, moments. Just give her a moment, she'll come around to the point._

_("Several moments.") _She remembers Maura's voice.

Something about it had seemed just the slightest bit odd, though not enough to raise a flag at the time. Maybe it was unlike Maura to quantify time so vaguely as with "moments". She deals in precise grams and seconds and millimeters. Trying to place the conversation, she runs a background check through her mind.

_("Not simultaneously. Several moments.") _

They'd been talking about the police. About how long it took the police to arrive at the scene after Jane was knocked unconscious.

Her eyes narrow slightly, and drift back to her girlfriend's. Was that phrasing not a coincidence?

"Was that what you meant when you said the police..."

Maura nods, already waiting there at the point where Jane had just arrived.

"I thought you meant, I dunno, less than a minute." She blinks. "So it was more like.. what? ... _ten_ minutes?"

"Approximately. Perhaps that's a slightly high estimate... I can't be certain."

Not thrilled to have been misled by one of Maura's deliberate loopholings, Jane barely stops herself from asking her to verify that they're using the same definition of 'minutes'.

_Ten-ish minutes is awfully long for her to be effectively alone with that guy. Or guys. __Actually, wow, it's a miracle that nothing..._

She darkens.

"So what happened in those ten..." Jane feels her heart rate increasing in a way she does not like, and it only gets worse with every second Maura goes without answering.

"Maura, did they hurt you?" she asks, leaning in sharply.

She watches her girlfriend's face slowly freeze over like a pond in winter. She can't name one specific thing that has changed about her expression, but just like that, Maura is gone and she's sitting there with Dr. Isles.

Jane hates when she does that. Dr. Isles only ever talks to her when Maura doesn't want to; she is the giver of cold shoulders, the bearer of bad news.

It's the suffocating feeling of dread in her own chest that actually tells Jane what has happened; the three quiet, emotionless words which Dr. Isles delivers are only a formality.

Instantly, Jane's eyes are full of corrosive tears, and she blinks and shakes to try to get them to spill out so she can see again. To a see a reason why what's happening isn't real.

She wonders if it's possible for blood to skid to a stop in your veins.

_No. You misheard. She's joking. It's a dream. She's talking about someone else. _

Jane's heard her say the word "rape" hundreds of times. Often in a clinical, detached way. It's just one more fact to list among all the others, one more observation that gets murmured into the voice recorder during autopsies. That same word in that same tone, this time, has halted the Earth's spinning and pitched Jane into the void of space. She can't breathe. She can't right herself.

And she hears the most pointless of all possible responses come out on only a broken shard of her voice: "_What_?"

No response comes back. One isn't really warranted. She can feel her face going white.

"Oh God, no..." She's desperate to put her arms around Maura, but Maura isn't back yet. The doctor stares forward, unbelievably composed. Her icy force field is not an invitation for a hug. "Maura, I'm so sorry..."

_Please, no. Please not her._

Despite those first unshed flash-tears of shock, Jane isn't crying. Not yet. The words will need to wash over her a few hundred more times before they'll really sink in.

It's not that she's reacting calmly - it's just that every emotion is rushing in at once - horror, fury, sympathy, love, despair, disbelief, disgust, panic - forming a traffic jam in her throat and nothing comes out. She doesn't know which way to feel yet. This is just the calm before the storm. But even though she feels despicable for even being _able_ to think semi-calmly, it's a good opportunity to do so, before the real reactions kick in.

_Handle this right. This is so important. You have to handle this right. What do you do. What does she need?_

Though she's never worked the Sexual Assault Unit, rape and homicide aren't total strangers, and Jane has spoken with enough survivors to know the ground rules. Or, she ought to.

_What do they say? Believe her. No breaking down in front of her. Don't threaten to kill the guy. Not too many questions. Respect her space. Let her make choices. Listen. Listen. Listen._

She's explained these rules to husbands and boyfriends and families. Not all of them sound possible at the moment.

Deep breaths attempt to fight nausea.

_They hurt her. They hurt her._

_I'm gonna personally castrate this son of a bitch._

Anger momentarily bubbles up past all the other emotions; she realizes she doesn't even know where to direct it.

"Who did this to you?" Her voice cracks under the weight of the war waged in it.

The doctor shakes her head.

"The dead one."

It's a relief; at least they don't have to worry about him anymore. But it's also kind of a disappointment; Jane would have loved to catch him. To have the decision whether to just blow his goddamn head off the moment she laid eyes on him. To have that moment where maybe Frost would have to pull her back, maybe Korsak would have to convince her to do it right. She'd have ultimately chosen to do the right thing anyway... but she would have loved having the decision. Now she doesn't.

"I'm relieved that I don't have to think about prosecuting him. It would have been so hard. No one else knew, and I had the luxury of being able to decide to just get through it at my own speed... on my own terms..." She's starting to talk faster as Dr. Isles begins to thaw.

"I said I was okay, which was true in a relative sense... the danger had passed, I'd sustained no life-threatening injuries, and not least of all, _you_ were okay... I didn't want to be 'Poor Maura'. I don't want pity. I knew how hurt everyone would be, I wanted to save you the pain since there was nothing you could do about it anyway... an-nd then days were passing and I.. I was afraid you'd be upset with me that I hadn't told you right away-"

"No, no," Jane says quickly. "That's _your_ choice, nobody's allowed be upset with you for that. It just breaks my heart that you've been going through this alone. Please don't worry about that for another second, sweetie, I'm only here to help. You can come to me with anything and I'll be on your side no matter what, okay?"

She'd thought that all went without saying, but the way hazel eyes fleetingly meet hers and accompany a slight smile of gratitude, she can tell that it must have helped to hear.

She holds out her hand and Maura's slips into it, fingers filling the spaces between fingers. It feels like a small victory, a tiny break in the clouds.

In Jane's world, this tragedy happened right now - she keeps having to re-realize that it actually happened two weeks ago. Two whole _weeks_, where Maura's pain might have been the greatest, and she'd had no support at all. She tries to tamp down the nausea in her stomach with another huge breath of air.

"I'm always here to listen," Jane adds carefully. "Or just sit. Or whatever you want. You can tell me as much or as little as you want to, and whenever you feel like it."

_I have to know everything. Please, never tell me anything._

"There isn't much to say. It was... brief." Maura says, shrugging, thoughtfully selecting the fewest number of words to inflict on her. "Not.. excessively violent."

Jane tries to tell herself these words are supposed to sound like good news, in a relative sense. "Good" news. """""Good""""" news. She wants to throw up.

_They hurt her._

_Be strong. You have to be strong._

"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, all this time... oh God, I had _you_ taking care of _me!_ You were going through this and I let you bring me mashed potatoes on the couch like a big baby... I haven't even been there for you," she claps a hand over her mouth, growing more horrified with each realization.

"Yes, you have. You've been there for me all along. You just didn't know exactly how much it meant to me."

"But.. if I'd known that I never..."

"I know," Maura says softly. "I wanted it that way. I just wanted everything normal. You know it helps me to focus on other things when something is bothering me, and sympathy - no matter how much I wanted it at times - would have prevented that. And your well-being was no inconsequential distraction. You _were_ legitimately injured."

Jane could choke on the lump in her throat.

"The nightmares," she realizes. "The _hives_..."

Maura nods.

"What can I do?"

There's no ingredients to go gather for a magic potion that will fix this. There's not really anything that she, or anybody, can do to make the pain go away.

Maura just gives her a sad smile, and Jane knows she would only be saying, _turn back time, _but she isn't, probably because it would only make Jane feel bad.

___You wouldn't have to wish you could turn back time if you'd just done it right in the first place._  


_This is your fault. _Though it's been dancing in the back of her mind for several minutes, this thought, now given full attention, rattles through her like an ice cube dropped down her spine.

_They hurt her. Because you didn't stop it._

_You failed her._

Her girlfriend's voice saves her from her own mind.

"Just.. know. Just carry this with me." Even though she's asking for something so basic, so little, there's a hint of a question mark at the end.

Jane nods eagerly, desperately, offering another hug and letting Maura close the distance. She gathers her in her arms fiercely, protectively, just staring at the couch behind her, before tears muddle the image once more.

"I'll carry as much as you can give me," she promises, squeezing her tight. Wanting to squeeze until their bodies merge, until she can physically fit Maura into her own heart and carry her around safely in there, where nothing can ever hurt her again.

_You have to say something positive._ She searches desperately.

"I'm glad you decided to tell me. And I wanna make you glad you did. I'm here to help any way I can, okay?"

"Thank you," Maura says, gently interrupting. "But.. I just had to tell you that in order to explain..."

"Hm?"

Maura sighs and faces front again, eyes searching, as if the words she's looking for are scattered on the coffee table.

She holds onto Jane's hand with both of hers, like it's her only lifeline. Trembling faintly.

Her head hangs so low.

Her voice is so tiny.

"Jane, I'm pregnant."

Jane's eyes close. She didn't think her stomach could sink any further.

"God."

The halves of her already broken heart are shredding into smaller and smaller pieces.

Like this needed to be worse.

Not that there's anyone who _does_ deserve this, but she can't think of anyone who deserves it less than Maura.

"Maur, I'm ... I don't even know words for how sorry I am."

"I should've..." Maura shakes her head, tears not far off. "See, I was so glad he used a condom, I guess to minim-mize evi-dence so I wouldn't be able t..."

Jane's glad Maura isn't looking at her right now, because there's nothing she can do to stop her face from looking like she's about to be sick. Trying to block out the pictures her mind is drawing, she focuses on moving her hand in circles on Maura's back.

_ Smooth circles. Smooth and steady. Everything depends on the circles. Don't mess up. _

"... and I... just got back the last blood test I ra-ran to make sure I hadn't.. still contracted anything I could ever.. pass on-n to you, and..." she hides her face in her free hand.

Yet another wave of unpleasant realization rolls through Jane.

"_That_ was the blood work you were looking at this afternoon."

Maura's eyes could have burned a hole in that paper. They hadn't looked right.

_She's never surprised about test results because she doesn't guess first. You should have picked that up._

_No, worse - you _did_ pick that up, you were just too insensitive to see something was wrong. You made some stupid joke and left._

"I didn't give you a chance to tell me," Jane croaks, remorsefully. "I was right there and I walked away..."

"I wouldn't have told you, even if we weren't busy. Not at work." She sniffs. "I just couldn't believe what I was seeing. I had no idea that... I mean, I haven't even _felt_..." Maura's voice thickens and distorts with the onset of tears until it breaks. Her head hangs low again.

Jane slides off the edge of the couch and onto her knees in front of her. Holding both her hands. Easing her forehead up underneath Maura's until she is gently supporting the weight of her head.

Above her, the last of the ice melts. A warm droplet falls onto her cheek, rolling down the same tracks as her own.

_Tell her. Say everything she needs to hear. Be it._

"Okay." She reaches up to brush a thumb under her Maura's ear, the way she likes. "Listen. That was the last minute you were ever alone in this. You're not alone anymore. You've been so strong on your own, and we'll be even stronger together, cause I'm right here with you no matter what, okay? And there's not one thing in this world I wouldn't do for you, you know that, right?" She murmurs softly, keeping the conversation private between them even in an otherwise empty house. "I love you so much, Maura. _Everybody_ loves you, they'll all help you too, if you wanna tell them. Anybody, anything I got is yours... and whatever you need, I'm _on_ it, okay? You got me. For whatever it's worth, you got me, I promise." She straightens up as tall as she can on her knees, and presses a long, firm kiss to Maura's forehead before wrapping her tightly in her arms. "I promise."

Jane feels like maybe she's at least managed to say something right when Maura encircles her just as tightly and then suddenly gets much heavier, really resting her burden on her shoulders for the first time. She is so glad to bear the weight.

"It's worth everything," Maura whispers against the crook of her neck.

Jane kisses her hair and rocks her, and her stomach twists as the news hits her all over again.

Right now, all she can do is hold her. Or maybe more accurately, hold _on_ to her.

And they cry together.

The rest of the evening is very quiet. A million thoughts need time to gel. Dinner is forgotten.

In bed, Jane holds Maura tighter than ever and stares across the room, unblinking but seeing nothing.

There's something she would like to promise Maura before she goes to sleep. But she has to scroll though all the prerequisites first, and make sure it's authorized.

_Is there any outcome that I couldn't handle? Is there anything that could happen that could make me give up on her, refuse to support her, stop loving her, leave her side?_

_What if she doesn't want it if she does want it if she gives it up for adoption if she gets depressed if she loses it if she wants an abortion if she quits work if she wants me to quit work if it's conjoined twins if it's conjoined quintuplets if there are bad complications if she's never the same if she never wants me to touch her again_

She can't find one where she stops loving Maura.

_Authorization granted._

"It'll be okay, Maur," she whispers. "We can make it be okay. We'll get through it. You're gonna be okay."

Exhaustion, plus hopefully a measure of relief, allows Maura to actually fall asleep.

But not Jane.

* * *

_A/N - So of course this isn't the only chapter that will ever refer to what happened, but I do want to state that this is the only detail I ever intend to go into about the actual __rape. __I also want to underline the point for those of you who've been waiting to see how I was going to handle 'the rape scene', there won't be one. Jane didn't see it, and I'm never going to have Maura describe it, or flash back, or anything like that._

_Thank you for reading and I'd so truly appreciate hearing your thoughts, especially from this point forward. Although I have the events of the story outlined, the details and emotions have room to flex; I'd love to be able to draw on a mosaic of real reactions, experiences, feelings, and expectations rather than what my limited mind conjures alone._


	8. Day One

_The writing has gotten into difficult territory now, but your reviews make it worth it. __I want to take a second and especially thank all the wonderful people that have been publicly/privately/anonymously sending me their stories or just mentioning that they are survivors._ _I've been so nervous about this story, and support from you guys in particular feels like an enormous validation._

_This chapter is no picnic, but it won't be as hard as the last - I'm going to try to make it a rule never to give you two wholly awful updates in a row._

* * *

_Chapter Content: Nothing super trigger-specific, but still be generally cautioned since we obviously have a lot to discuss stemming from the last chapter. Also, I don't know if pregnancy/abortion count as triggers, but we'll be touching on that for a while._

* * *

The first three seconds of Jane's day are the happiest, because those are the ones before she remembers.

She spends the next ten trying to convince herself that last night was just an awful dream. And the next sixty trying to fall back asleep so she can have a do-over, and maybe somehow the dark clouds gathering overhead will be gone when she wakes up again. But none of it works. She stops trying to fight. This is day one. This is tomorrow, the one she promised to face at Maura's side, no matter its contents.

Instead she waits. Carefully avoiding waking Maura - surely her sleep is more peaceful than they day she'll wake up to. Carefully avoiding falling back to sleep herself - she wants to be ready to make sure the first thing Maura sees today is a smile.

A few wispy golden hairs are tickled lazily by the bedroom air current, so close to Jane's eyes that they're out of focus. She spaces out on them. And on the faint warm breaths on her collarbone, uniform and steady like clockwork. And on the weight of the arm slung over her waist, shifting with her breathing.

The alarm will be going off soon. Jane debates turning it off to let her sleep longer, but decides Maura had set the alarm intentionally and she shouldn't take even that small piece of control away from her. She's disappointed to hear the beeping. Now the day has to begin for real.

When their eyes meet, Jane offers the smile she's been crafting for 20 minutes. It can't be a piteous smile that sets a downbeat tone for the whole day, but not so happy that it's a sugar-coated lie. She sets her face to an honest _hey, I'm glad to see you _that neither mentions nor ignores what's happened, and kisses her cheek.

Sleepily, the blonde smiles back before she begins to stretch.

The day has begun well.

* * *

Warm water cascades over her shoulders, making a path down the undersides of her arms, streaming off her pinky fingers. She points a pinky at the tile wall like an upside-down finger gun, shooting away a fleck of soap suds.

She expected to cry in here, and she's sort of lingering, giving herself a chance to. But she isn't. She feels like she should be. Maybe she's numbed herself a little, or it still didn't sink in all the way yet.

A scarred hand runs over her stomach, over the small, mostly-healed cut a few inches below her navel, new wound getting acquainted with old. The other scrapes on her arms and hands have healed, but this one is taking longer. It doesn't hurt, but there's still a little pink mark. She wonders why it's slower. If Maura were in here, she'd probably be explaining that without even having to be asked.

She wonders what Maura's body looked like when she showered in this spot 10 minutes earlier. She hasn't seen it lately. Probably Maura just doesn't feel like being exposed. She wonders if there are bruises.

Oh. She found something that could make her cry.

_But you've been in here too long already. Think about that later. _

The soap has long since been rinsed off.

* * *

On the average Saturday they have only a microscopic breakfast, and Angela shows up later for a proper brunch. Maura had eaten a little yogurt earlier and now that she's started making crepes, she appears to be following average Saturday protocol.

Jane's mind is a tornado of awful mental pictures, uncomfortable questions, and rough drafts of comforting things to try to say, but she keeps quiet. She'll let it stay a normal day until Maura feels like bringing up the elephant in the room.

But she can still help out in the meantime.

"I can do that Maur, you relax," she says, reaching out for the egg in her girlfriend's hand.

"I can do it. I want to." It cracks against the side of the bowl, split expertly with one hand.

Jane opens her mouth to insist on saving her the trouble, but then closes it. There was more meaning in that response than just face-value.

_This isn't brand new. She's been doing things all along._

Even though Jane would love to relieve her of every possible chore and worry, taking away little everyday tasks from Maura would probably actually make her feel worse.

That's the way Jane had felt after Hoyt, after Merino. Everyone had felt bad and just wanted to hug her and pet her and feed her, like she was a sick little kid or an injured pet. Well-meaning hovering and butting in and constant favors whether she welcomed them or not. She wanted to keep being a competent person and wished everybody would just treat her like normal. Maura was the only one who did - sure, she hovered too, but somehow she never made Jane feel _diminished_, like everyone else did.

It's not a stretch to consider that Maura probably feels that same way. Maybe this is one of the reasons she hadn't wanted to tell anybody. Maybe she was afraid she'd have been "relieved" of the normalcy of little things like cooking crepes herself. It wouldn't be a relief; she _wants_ that. She wants the usefulness. She wants the distraction. And not that Jane can't follow a recipe, but she probably wants the crepes to taste good.

Another egg cracks.

Jane will have to find that point where sympathy and respect intersect. She wants to be there to help Maura in every possible way, but not treat her like she's... less. Because she isn't.

Maura catches her watching, and finds as much admiration in her eyes as sorrow. She blinks a question mark.

"You know, when I got hurt- pick a time," Jane snorts, "...you were the only one who still treated me like me. I was too much of a jerk to tell you I appreciated it. You helped out a lot.. a _lot_, but you never treated me like you thought I was broken."

Maura's focus falls somewhere between them in thought.

"I know you're not broken," she adds softly.

Hazel eyes return to hers. Calm. Appreciative.

"Thank you."

_But that doesn't mean she isn't hurting._

Jane would like to say more, but this is getting too close to starting a talk. She keeps silent and looks for something to busy herself with.

There's no need to summon Jo for her breakfast; she's already prancing in excited circles underfoot at the sound of Jane grabbing the bag of dog food out of the pantry.

"Huh, what's this?" Jo's usual water and food dishes are missing, replaced by two new contraptions - bowls with clear upright containers attached. "Maura, c'mere and look at what my dog invented."

"Oh, those came the other day, I meant to ask if you'd set them up," Maura explains. "You put food and water in the containers and set a timer, and it dispenses automatically. I thought this would eliminate those times we worry about her going unfed when we work irregular hours. I should have thought of it sooner."

"Hm. That's nice." _Hate to think how much these cost._ "Okay, so we just... put this in here, I guess... alright, just a second, Jo," she nudges away her whining little dog with one knee and pours a bunch of food into the dispenser.

"How do... oh, I guess plugging it in would be helpful..." she sits down on the kitchen floor to figure it out.

_How are you supposed to set this timer? It's your fault she got hurt. What does this knob do?_

"The instructions are on the counter behind you."

_"Ppfft." _Jane fiddles with the timer.

_You should have known she wouldn't be buying all this crap off the internet if she was just upset over a one-day thing._

_At least it's slightly more practical crap this time. Well, some of it. Shoulda known a friggin Slanket was a cry for help._

"So then I turn this thing... it- _move_, Jo.."

"I went to a therapist," Maura blurts suddenly, turning to check Jane's eyes for a reaction. Waiting for her to say, _Why? When? So you could tell a stranger, but not me?_

And Jane does think it. But she also understands.

"Did it help?"

It must not have been a response Maura expected. She seems to relax a bit.

"Yes. She's an old friend of mine, so it wasn't a totally formal thing."

"Good." Jane says, focusing on the timer again. Or acting like she is. "I'm glad you talked to somebody."

The whisk _tink-tink-tinks_ against the side of Maura's mixing bowl.

"Jane, it... I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner. It truly wasn't because I didn't want your reaction, I just didn't want to tell _anyone _close to me. I didn't consider the therapist to count."

"It's okay, really, I understand. I really am glad you didn't keep it to yourself. And you don't owe me an explanation, anyway."

_How long was she going to wait before she told me? Did she only decide to tell me at all because she found out she's pregnant? _

"But I know it probably hurt you, and I'm sorry for that. The fact is... well, I still have a lot more experience dealing with things on my own. I was alone.. emotionally, if not socially, for so much of my life. I got overwhelmed and I... I reverted to what I know best. But I shouldn't do that, now that we're together."

"You should do whatever helps you," Jane counters. "It's fine as long as it's because you _wanted_ to deal with it on your own, not because you thought you didn't have any other choice."

Maura takes a long time to decide to respond only with a nod, leaving only the sound of whisking and Jo's crunchy chewing to fill the kitchen.

Jane gets a carton of strawberries from the refrigerator and starts to slice some to top the crepes with. She doesn't really even want them. It's just to keep busy.

A dollop of batter sizzles faintly as it hits the griddle. Jane pauses her own work, watching Maura bring the crepe trowel around, spreading a perfect paper-thin circle with the same flawless precision she brings to everything. It requires a calm and steady hand. Jane is glad to see her manage it.

Meanwhile, the blade of the knife in her own grasp is visibly shaking, no matter how still she tries to hold it. Her guts feel all sour.

_What must _she_ feel like, then._

The fewer details Girlfriend Jane knows, the better, yet Detective Jane can't help but be curious about some of the missing puzzle pieces. But she doesn't want to pry, especially if her questions could sound judgmental or challenging. After all, what's done is done; her own understanding isn't more important than just accepting what Maura has said.

The most important thing is that Maura took care of herself. She _had_ disappeared for a few long stretches while they were at the hospital checking out Jane's concussion - maybe that's what she was doing? However it happened, Jane just needs to know that it happened.

"So... I know you know what you're doing, but I just please need to make sure of one thing - you had whatever medical attention you needed, right?"

"Yes." She says it like drawing a neat checkmark in the box.

"Good." Jane lets silence linger to show that she really isn't going to ask any details.

_No details at all. Not how much she's really hurting, emotionally or physically. Not how often she's cried, or what I was doing at those times instead of comforting her._

Maura slides the long, flat turner underneath her finished crepe, folding it precisely in half, quarters, eighths.

"I will have to have some examination for the pregnancy, though, regardless of what I do about it," she adds, plating it up.

"I'll take you," Jane volunteers quickly, almost cutting her off. "You wanna go together?"

"That would be a comfort." Her answer is calm, but her eye contact shows just how much she appreciates the offer.

Jane nods, smiling softly.

Maura smooths out another circle of batter.

"Termination was my first thought," she says quietly without turning around.

This is no shock to Jane.

"K. Well, I'll help you do whatever you wanna do."

"I know you're a little bit more.. conservative about some things than I am.."

"Uh, not _that_ much," the brunette rolls her shoulders. "And it wouldn't matter if I was. It's not me."

She's probably the most liberal specimen her family has ever produced, but there's still a residue from her Catholic upbringing left on some issues, no matter how many times she reasons to herself that she doesn't even agree.

"It would matter," Maura says. "I'd hate to find out that you... resented me for it, or anything like that."

"What am I, Michael Corleone?" she scoffs with a smile, wondering too late if Maura would even know the reference. "Even if I had a problem with that, which I don't, it's not like I'd have any place tellin' you what to do."

"Maybe not, but I still care what you think."

"I think that's fine. I want you to do exactly what you want to do, and no matter what you decide that is, I'm gonna be behind you all the way. Alright?_"_

Maura gives a smile that turns genuine only once she decides that Jane means it.

"So.. you haven't had morning sickness or anything?"

"No. A little fatigue, malaise, yes... but I attributed that to emotional distress," she shrugs.

There's a shave-and-a-haircut knock at the side door. Jane sighs. It's not like Angela's arrival is a surprise, but she still hates for this conversation to be interrupted.

"Want me to get rid of her?" she offers.

"Of course not."

She hopes Maura actually welcomes Angela's visit, and isn't just enduring it to be polite. Since there's been no mention of it, Jane doesn't even ask whether she plans on letting Angela in on the news.

Monumentally distracted, they're both quiet over brunch, but Angela doesn't seem to notice she's talking (or eating) enough for all three of them. Jane tunes in and out. Her casual gossip and chattering seems so insensitive, so irritatingly trivial, but of course she has no way of knowing any better. Thankfully, she finds an Iron Chef rerun to get absorbed in.

"I'd be good on this show," she says, as she does every time she watches it. Probably even when she's alone.

Normally Maura likes to be more civilized than to watch TV during meals, but today it's completely welcome. It remains on even after Angela leaves, with her obliviousness fully intact.

Jane quietly takes care of the dishes and then, not sure where the day is going from here, returns to her chair at the table across from her girlfriend.

"What do you feel like doin' today?"

Maura shrugs. She doesn't look shell-shocked or depressed. Just... neutral.

Jane spaces out on the background murmur of the TV, lost in her worries.

"I, uh.." Maura taps a few times on the table with her finger. "I thought of something you could do that would help me."

Jane sits up, brightening like she's just been offered World Series tickets.

"Name it?"

Maura smiles at her eagerness.

"Well.. a significant part of the stress I've been under has been from keeping this a secret. It's been... taxing, with your mother..."

"I'll take her to look at apartments _today_, if she's bother-"

"No! No, she's not bothering me. I just meant that you and she are the ones it's been most difficult to keep it from, since you're the two I talk to most. I decided I do want her to know... but it's just difficult news to break."

"So you want me to tell her for you?" she offers. _That's gonna suck._

"That would certainly take a load off my mind. But I'd understand if it's too much to ask.."

"Nothing is."

She lays her open palm on the table, and Maura tops it with her own, giving a light squeeze.

* * *

_A/N - __Since we'll be on topic for a while, I just want to say preemptively, **please **don't comment just to tell your stance on abortion. The views I write here are the ones__ I expect each character to realistically hold considering their backgrounds - I'm truly not trying to advocate any particular one, or express my own, so I think it's fair to ask you to leave yours out of the reviews as much as is reasonable. I don't want a debate in the comments._

_A couple people have asked why Maura didn't take a morning after pill. I wanted to avoid going into any more detail about the assault and its surrounding physical care than I already have (implying that Maura didn't know the condom had broken). Maybe she didn't think she needed to take extra precautions, or maybe she did and they weren't effective - Jane doesn't know. It doesn't change anything. I realize that sounds like a cop-out, and maybe it kind of is, but it's at my discretion to leave some details and realities "off-screen" especially since this story is from Jane's POV as a secondary survivor, and loved ones don't always get every detail. I mean to focus on the emotion and the relationship - this won't be the most comprehensive or realistic documentation of assault/recovery ever written, but A) I'm admittedly ignorant of what that would be and B) I think that would put off more people than it would satisfy._


	9. Nausea Gravidarum

Jane expected to have to play goalie to keep her mother from sailing right out the door and full-speed at Maura. But she's only sitting there on the sofa of her guest house, with one hand on her chest and a quiet look of pain.

Fortunately, Jane hadn't actually had to speak the most difficult words; the first and worst assumption had been the correct one. Why is it that every other crime you have to explain, but with this one all you have to do is hesitate, and people just _know_?

Jane had then launched straight into a list of disclaimers. While her mother is certainly no nun, she _is_ much more actively Catholic than Jane, and has a poor track record for minding her own business.

"I think she kept it quiet partly because she didn't want to upset us, so I tried not to go totally nuts, and don't you, either, it'll only make her feel bad," she continues to instruct, pacing. "You can _not_ tell anybody. It's only up to her who gets told... and you absolutely can _not_ try to tell her what to do. About anything. No abortion stuff, you hear me? I know what you think about that, and that's fine, but she thinks different I don't want you bothering her about it. It's nobody's business but hers. She needs to make every decision herself... it's really really important that she's in control. She has to get her control back. We have no idea what she's going through and we have to just let her have her space if she.."

It's not until she pauses her tirade that she realizes her mother hasn't actually said anything to deserve it yet.

Angela seems to step over it all, focusing only on the pain in Jane's face.

"I'm sorry, Jane," she rises from the couch and pulls her daughter into a hug. "For her and for you."

Although the hug is a welcome one, Jane remains mostly stiff, knowing that if she really melted into it she'd start crying.

_Don't break._

"Now," Angela slips back, still holding onto her arms, "tell me what you've said to her. About the whole thing, I mean, what did you say when she told you?"

Jane blinks, slightly thrown by the way her mother's first order of business _isn't_ lecturing about abortion.

"I said.. I said I loved her and I'd be there for her no matter what happens... that I was sorry," she shrugs. "I know there's gotta be more I should say than that, but I can't think of a right way to put anything.. and even if I could, I don't wanna keep bringing it up..."

"No, that's good. There's no situation where those three things _aren't_ the right thing to say," Angela advises. "_Keep_ saying it. Don't leave room where she can start to wonder if it wore off since the last time you said it. You can't tell somebody you love them too many times."

"I will," Jane nods.

"Now, what do you think about what she wants to do?"

Jane hardens._ Oh, here it comes._

"I think it's her decision."

"I know, but what do _you_ think about it? Between you and me, you're really okay with that?"

"Yes?" Jane shifts her weight. "Look, can we not start a whole _thing_ right now?"

"I just wondered what you thought," Angela raises her hands defensively.

Jane bites her cheek.

As a Catholic, she was taught that life begins at the moment of conception. If she searches deep down for a belief on the subject, it's probably still that one, although it's too weak to fuel an argument, and certainly too weak to dispute Maura's wishes. It's just that she's never officially rejected or traded it for a different belief, because she's never thought about it that much, period. As far as she can tell, she just feels like she's _supposed_ to think it's wrong.

"It's medically and legally okay, and that's all the bottom line I need. But it doesn't matter whether you or I agree - if that's what she wants, nobody's gonna get in her way."

"Okay."

"What are _you_ gonna say to her?" Jane asks, suspicious at the ease of her answer.

"I'm gonna tell her she'll be okay, ask if there's anything I can help with, see if she wants to talk about her options..."

"Is that code for trying to talk her out of an abortion?"

"No, it's plain English for talking about options. That's what she does when she's facing any big decision, she looks at all the different choices and then she decides on the best one. Why should this be different?"

"It's not like she doesn't already _know_ all the options," Jane points out.

"Everybody knows, but she hasn't even had a whole day to think about it! This is big, you don't just make a snap decision. You think I'm going to go over there and try to force her to do what I'd want instead of what she wants? Don't you think I _know_ she has to do what she wants? I know you're looking out for her, but you be careful you don't push her into that when she's still just thinking about it. If you don't even want her talking about any other way, you're just like you think I am."

"I'm not push-"

"And let me tell you something else, you talk to me like I never heard of this happening to anybody before. I know you've seen things I haven't, but I wasn't born yesterday, missy. You forget sometimes, _you're_ born closer to yesterday than me."

Jane swallows. She's still feeling combative, but Angela does have the numbers on her side. Knowing her mother has lived a relatively sheltered life compared to her own, maybe she does forget to respect her years sometimes.

"Can I go over there now?" Angela asks. There's tension in her tone, but Jane can't tell whether she's just upset for Maura or a little pissed, too.

"Yeah. She'd like to see you. I just wanted to save her tellin' it again. ...Ma?" She brushes her mother's arm as she passes. "I'm.. I didn't mean to be so... I'm just trying not to freak out, y'know? I just gotta keep anything else from hurting her." She presses her lips together to keep them from trembling. "I don't know how else to help."

"I know, honey," Angela answers, immediately softer, hugging her daughter again. "I don't want to hurt her, either. Give me a little credit, okay?"

Wondering whether she'll regret it, Jane nods.

Even though they'd finished brunch barely over an hour ago, it feels like a different day when the Rizzoli women walk back in and find Maura sitting right where they left her. Silently, Angela heads for her with open arms; Maura rises from her chair with a weak smile and fills them.

Despite the occasion, Jane can't help but smile at the length and mutual sincerity of the hug. Angela is murmuring things which she can't entirely make out, though Maura's face shows it's doing her good to hear.

Jane eventually starts to feel a bit like a third wheel just standing there, but she doesn't trust her mother quite enough to leave Maura without a buffer.

They all sit down together. No one talks too much. It's nicer that way than feelings gushing a mile a minute, although Jane isn't sure why that isn't happening. The silences aren't awkward.

Until Maura asks out of the blue, "Jane mentioned my plans?"

Angela nods. Jane gulps.

"I know we've never discussed that issue specifically, but.. given your faith, I don't expect to hear that you're completely.. in support of that idea."

Jane cocks her elbow to fire into her mother's ribs if necessary.

"To be honest, I can't say I'd do that in your position," Angela replies. "But nobody can make up your mind for you, and I'm not here to try."

Maura stares at her lap.

"Even though I don't share your beliefs, I want... I want you to know that don't relish disappointing you."

Jane's eyes dart back over to her mother like she's following tennis match, except most tennis matches don't tie her stomach in knots. She didn't realize Maura had actually been nervous about this. Her mouth opens to interrupt, but words don't come out quick enough.

"I wouldn't be disappointed in you. You have to do what your heart tells you. I would only be disappointed _for_ you, if you went against what it says," Angela answers carefully.

_Hm. Better than expected_...

"All the advice I want to tell you is, take your time and make sure you can hear what your heart says, loud and clear," she continues. "And be sure you look at _all_ your choices, even if you don't think you're interested. Decisions are like crossing the street - you have to look both ways to be safe, not just right ahead at where you wanna go."

Maura smiles and pats Angela's hand. She's already in the habit of researching before making even trivial decisions, but she's probably never had it explained to her in quite such a motherly way.

"That is good advice. I promise my decision will be a well-informed one."

"Good. I'm sure you _have_ thought about adoption and everything..."

Jane shifts in her seat. _K, got the picture, Ma.._

There's a sniff of laughter from Maura, the kind that does not come from amusement.

"Yes. I have." The answer comes without a pause for reflection. "I wouldn't bring a child into the world just to abandon them. To have them grow up doubting... who they are, if their existence isn't just a burden. I couldn't take knowing there's some child out in the world carrying that in their heart because of me. And then to know.. just how much it hurts for them to look me in the eye someday as an adult.. and wait for me to explain why I didn't love them... no. I couldn't do that to someone."

It's clear that she hasn't developed this opinion just in the last 24 hours.

Jane wonders how many times in a row her heart can break. The broken pieces must be tiny as dust now.

"I see your point. I'm not sure I could do that, either," she replies quietly. The admission is a bit unexpected. "Well. How about some tea?"

Maura regards her for a moment and then accepts with a nod.

Jane gives her mother a small smile of appreciation as she gets up. She's right that the options should be discussed, but Jane's glad that she had the sense to let this particular conversation go.

"Maura?" the older woman pauses. "You were a blessing to your parents, not a burden. I know because you're a blessing to this family, too. You are to anybody who knows you." She leaves Maura with an audible kiss right on top of the head.

Jane smiles. _Go, Ma._

Maura's eyes glisten as they follow Angela across the kitchen, a look of tentative hope on her face, like she's daring herself to risk believing the most true and obvious thing in the world.

* * *

The entirety of the weekend is spent at home. Jane doesn't relax for an instant, making sure to appear totally available at every moment in case Maura wants an ear or a shoulder, but at the same time trying to keep herself in check about not hovering too much.

But to her confusion, Maura acts almost normal. And it's not pretending-it-didn't-happen-normal - it looks for all the world like she just isn't terribly upset. She spends most of the time reading or using her laptop, and still joins Jane for a little TV before bed like they usually do. But there's no way Maura can really be that okay. Not with the way Jane is constantly tense and sick and fidgeting and trying not to cry in front of her - however bad _she_ feels, Maura must feel a hundred times worse. Right?

Angela takes her post as their personal chef for the weekend and dispenses with not a single word of moral lecture. Even though she makes the same dishes Jane has devoured and loved a million times before, they all taste like cardboard, and Jane ends up pushing most of it around her plate. Her feeble appetite is satisfied in only a few bites at each meal, but she eats a little more for the sake of appearances, trying not to call extra attention to how upset she is.

As the weekend comes to a close, she's completely baffled to remember that she has a job to return to.

Walking back into work seems so pointless. She looks at everything and everyone in the building with offense. Don't these people know she has serious stuff going on at home?

_No, this is even more serious. People got killed. People who somebody loved. Other peoples' Mauras. You have to find out who hurt them._

It's only when she finds a way to think of things in terms of Maura that she can actually find the motivation to work.

But that motivation soon carries her too far, and she finds herself on the brink of tears. A whole weekend of privacy where she could have bawled to her heart's content, and _right now_ at work is when it has to hit her.

_Breathe. Don't break. _

Jane could go on all day like this, and it's not fair to the poor person whose death she's supposed to be devoting her full attention to.

_What if Maura got killed and the detective working her case was all lost in his own head about something going on at home? Would that be okay with you?_

_That absolutely could have happened, you know. __They could have killed her on top of everything else, and that would be your fault, too. __You could have woke up on that gurney and asked and asked where she was until somebody finally had to tell you. _

_You wouldn't have even gotten to say goodbye. __She'd probably already have been in a body bag. __Could you have gone to look at her? __You'd have to. Just to believe it._

_They would've had to shoot you like a rabid dog._

It's hard to breathe.

_Okay, actually no, stop relating everything to her._

Her throat is so tight that if she has to say a word to anybody, her messed up voice is going to attract a lot of questions. She excuses herself to the bathroom before anyone notices.

Instead of heading to the bathroom right down the hall, she decides to take the elevator one floor up. Neither she nor Maura have any business on this floor, and so her girlfriend is extremely unlikely to walk in looking for her. She locks herself in the stall at the end, and is already crying as she sets the timer on her phone for 10 minutes.

_She's not dead. It's not as bad as it could be. She's hurt, but she'll be okay._

Suddenly desperate to receive any message from Maura to confirm this, she takes her phone back out to compose a text. For the first time since they'd barely begun to forge a friendship, she stares at the screen with no idea what to type. Eventually she decides on simply sending a heart symbol.

Not very many women work in this building, but they all seem to know about this bathroom. Jane's almost never left fully alone, although she's thankful for the frequent roar of the hand dryer because it's hard to cry in total silence. She'll have to try a different floor next time.

Her phone buzzes with a reply from Maura. She smiles through her tears at the same heart symbol like it's the best gift she's ever gotten.

_I gotta go downstairs and see her. Right now._

_No, you have to get back to work. Ducking out to cry and talk to your girlfriend isn't getting any murderers off the street._

_I won't stay. I won't even say anything, I'll just walk in and hug her and walk out._

_No. She'll see you've been crying. You'll make her feel weird. Just get it together._

Jane leans her forehead against wall and tries to dry up before her timer goes off, knowing she'll need an extra couple minutes to make herself presentable.

That turns out to be impossible, no matter how much water she splashes on her face. She'll say she must be allergic to something. Had a sneezing fit, maybe. That'll explain her puffy eyes.

* * *

The week drags on. Jane wonders if a lack of proper food or rest is starting to catch up with her, or if she would feel this awful anyway from grief alone. It's like there's a big, heavy, suffocating shroud around her, and it's getting harder and harder to move under its weight. All she wants to do is hibernate for a month, yet given the chance to sleep each night, she lies awake for hours. She's not sure whether she _can't_ sleep, or prefers to use that time to focus on holding Maura, since it's the only highlight of her day.

Maura has a minor cry on Wednesday morning, and Jane's glad to see her vent a little, but it's not the big emotional outburst she's expecting. Maura must feel worse than she wants to show, so Jane has no choice but to hide her pain as well.

As if that isn't draining enough, homicide is still unable to get last week's same frustrating case off the ground, stuck on what should have been brief preliminary work. It's all office work, double and triple-checking the same dead ends over and over, and no amount of computer magic or rummaging through cold cases yields anything. They don't even have anybody to go out and question. Jane would be stir-crazy and climbing the walls if she had the energy. The only upside to being trapped at her desk is that at least she's close to Maura.

When Korsak eventually asks if she's ok, she says the case is pissing her off, and he lets it go. Frankly she doesn't even care how much he buys it. She just wants to be left alone as much as possible, and thankfully her partners know that well from past experience.

She makes sure to limit herself to only a few unexplained breaks per day; that's already bordering on unprofessional, and she doesn't want anybody to have to confront her about it. Nobody says a word when she drops her papers on her desk and stalks out of the bullpen.

Today's first break isn't to cry, it's to visit Maura. She can't be found in any of the usual places, which means she's in the bathroom. Considering all the "sneezing fits" Jane's had so far this week, she decides to extend Maura the option of saying she wants privacy by texting to ask where she is.

[ Restroom ] isn't quite an invitation, but it also isn't a rejection.

She pushes open the bathroom door and spots Jimmy Choos (or whatever) under the stall. They're facing the wrong way.

"..Oh." _Shit. Should I leave?_

_Not without making sure she's okay._

"You okay, Maur?" she asks gently.

A quiet "Yeah" comes back.

Jane shifts her weight uncertainly, about to ask whether she should go or stay, when there's a flush and the stall door opens.

"Fairly sudden onset of nausea gravidarum," Maura murmurs as she emerges, smoothing her hair. She looks put-together as always, although her eye makeup has run slightly on one side.

"I'm sorry." Jane receives her in a gentle hug, kissing her head, and they stand together silently for a minute.

Not that Jane didn't get it before, but this makes the pregnancy all the more frighteningly real.

_Here's one more thing you didn't stop her from having to go through._

"Feelin any better now?" she hopes.

"Somewhat." Maura takes a breath. "That was the first... I'm glad I already knew."

"Yeah."

Jane blinks back tears, glad Maura can't see her face.

_Don't break. Don't break. Seriously, don't._

"Can I get you a drink or something?"

"Some water would be nice. It's important to stay hydrated-"

"Thirty seconds," Jane says, breaking their hug to whip open the door.

"You don't have t-"

She doesn't hear her, already literally sprinting down the hall, feeling more purpose and urgency than Superman on his way to save a school bus. Her hand shakes as she feeds money into the nearest vending machine for an Aquafina, cursing the machine's slowness before rushing back.

"Thank you," Maura chuckles weakly as she fumbles to open the cap and hand it to her. She takes a few slow sips before regarding the bottle. "I thought that anyone who would throw away $2.50 for bottled water when there's a free water cooler right there is a sucker," she says, quoting Jane.

"Guess I'm a sucker," she replies, smiling at the levity. She wants to give Maura the best; even if it's exactly the same water either way, she at least wants the illusion of the nice bottle. And it's hard to run holding a crappy paper cone of water without spilling.

There's a buzz at her hip.

"Oh! Detective Frost texted me a minute ago and I completely forgot to write back," Maura pulls her own phone out of her pocket.

[ Know where Doc is? Need to talk about tox report ] She reads the text out loud. "Is that something we can ask Susie? I mean, do you wanna go home, or-"

"Don't be silly, of course I'm not going home. Susie _is_ qualified to interpret the results, but I'm still fit for work."

"Alright." She doesn't press. "I'll tell him to give you a minute, though."

[ She's busy. Give her 5. ]

Frost's reply is immediate. [ How'd I know she was busy with you? ;) ]

Eyes roll. Sometimes Jane wants to smack that guy like her littlest brother. Sure, she's almost always with Maura if she's not at her desk, but he makes it sound like they're always holed up in a supply closet somewhere getting it on. They've never come close to that. To be fair, she's never taken the time to explain otherwise, but it still irks her to know he would think that way. Like her feelings for Maura are just something cheap and physical. Is that what he thinks?

_Calm down, he didn't say that._

Maura turns to the mirror for a final check on her makeup, which she apparently fixed during Jane's absence.

"Do I look alright?"

"You look beautiful." She refuses to meet Maura's questioning look in the mirror when her voice falters. Instead she clenches her jaw, turning quickly to open the door for her.


	10. The Armor Doesn't Shine

_Chapter Content: This is a tough one. If one chapter in this story could make you cry, this is likely it. I'll say rape tw just to be cautious even though there are no real details, and nothing new happens, but definite sorrow warning because Jane's going to lose it a little bit._

* * *

_"JANE!"_

Jane gasps awake, prickling with sweat.

The sound of air filling her lungs seems so loud. Even louder than the echoes in her head, which are only starting to fade as she realizes Maura isn't really screaming, but sleeping quietly next to her. Their usual embrace has drifted apart due to the tossing and turnings of slumber - it's a good thing, considering how badly Jane is shaking.

_They hurt her_

Not wanting to wake her, she rolls out of bed and stands there for a moment, just trying to catch her breath. Drowning. Her only life preserver is to watch Maura in bed, and see her side slowly rise and fall. Convincing herself.

_Look, there she is. She's okay. It's weeks later. You're home in bed and okay. Nobody's hurting her. You were dreaming._

Her heart is burning and hammering so hard she wonders if it's trying to escape through her ribs.

_But what you saw was real. That happened. Not tonight, but it did happen._

She presses her hands to her face. It's searing hot. Or is it that her fingers are ice cold?

_They DID hurt her. And you didn't stop it. That's all real._

_I'm gonna throw up._

Her t-shirt feels soaked and disgusting; she pulls it off and mops the sweat from her chest with it. She tosses it in the general direction of her closet as she heads for the guest bathroom, where she'll be sure not to disturb Maura.

Walking down the hall, her eyes land on the faintly visible corner of one of the frames hanging on the wall. Even in the dark, she knows which one that is. She picks it off the wall as she passes.

In the guest bathroom, she clicks the light on and sets the frame aside on the bathroom counter. Turns on the faucet and splashes her face with cool water. Wipes it around the back of her neck. Leans over the sink on both elbows, face resting in her hands. Listens to her ears ring and the steady stream of water running down the drain. Watches the colors behind her eyelids.

Harmless abstract shapes then take on recognizable forms. The ones she'd just been seeing in her sleep. Things she doesn't ever want to see. And now they're there any time she closes her eyes.

_That happened when your eyes were closed. _

_That happened BECAUSE your eyes were closed._

Trying to shake the thoughts loose only makes her dizzy. She grabs handfuls of her hair to steady herself over the sink.

_Stopstopstopstop, _she chants silently. She isn't sure whether she's talking to her mind, or the man hurting Maura in it.

_Snyder twenty-three. _Her lips move along with her desperate thoughts. Distraction. Which she sometimes uses interchangeably with prayer._ Pedroia fifteen... Lester... shit what's...? Twenty..no .._

She can't hear the numbers over Maura screaming her name.

Warm trickles forge a path through the cold water droplets already on her cheeks.

_Stop stop_

What is that thing Maura said they used to do, where they drilled holes in peoples' heads thinking it would let out evil spirits? The idea almost kind of makes sense, right now. Does guilt count as an evil spirit?_  
_

_You should be guilty because it's your goddamn fault._

_And Maura would say you're wasting water._

She turns the handle off.

_What else would Maura say?_

_What else did Maura say?_

_Did she beg you to wake up? Was she screaming your name for help?_

Her teeth would be grinding much harder if they weren't chattering.

_How come your brain knew what it sounds like when she screams your name for help like that? Did you make that up, or did you really hear that and not know it?_

_She probably did call for you. __Somebody was hurting her. And you didn't help her._

In all her years of dealing with murder and gore and tragedy, these thoughts may be the most horrible her mind has ever entertained.

_Stop please stop_

Jane opens her eyes, which drift to the toilet as she debates whether to try to soothe away her nausea or just hasten the inevitable. Her stomach is churning, even though she's barely eaten lately.

_Just get it over with. No, it's going away. Maybe. No? No, you're okay. Yes. I think. Quit thinking about it._

She stares at the drain. At the faucet. At her fingers. At the bottle of soap.

_You're avoiding looking in the mirror._

Her eyes skirt the counter, rediscovering the picture frame.

'Boston Salutes Hero Cop.' Her big damn smiling face in newsprint, shiny medal pinned to a crisp uniform. Actually, that smile looks a little forced. She had never truly felt she deserved the title.

_You sure fucking don't._

_That's a dumb picture. Why don't they print what you really look like?_

She's afraid of what she might see in the mirror. Isn't that a classic nightmare people have, where their reflection is wrong somehow?

Slowly, her gaze crawls up the mirror until she meets her own eyes. Her own wet, beady, pink and empty eyes. It's just herself. But it's not quite a relief, either.

_You look like shit._

_'Failure Cop Can't Protect Own Girlfriend'. There's a headline that goes with you. Frame that one instead, we'll put it on the mantle._

So _this_ is how it feels to sit in the interrogation room and receive a damning look of cold disdain from Detective Jane Rizzoli. It feels weird to be on the giving end and the receiving end. The more she hardens her look, the more it hurts, the more she deserves it, the more she hardens.

Her fist wants to fly through that picture frame.

_Don't you break that, she bought that frame, not you. You'll just make a mess and cut yourself like a damn fool._

She opens the cabinet under the sink and stuffs it inside next to the extra toilet paper.

Finally she notices how hard she's shivering. Standing there topless, hunched over the cold counter top with water dripping down to her elbows. Tired.

The light is so bright. She clicks it back off.

She stares aimlessly into the dark, wondering if there's anywhere in this house she can rest where there are no imported fabrics to stain with tears. She realizes she's looking at it.

Crawling into the bathtub, she links her arms around her knees and tries in vain to calm down. Her breaths only grow sharper.

_You didn't help her._

There's nothing Jane treasures in the world above Maura. Sometimes she's terrified that this is all just a dream - Maura returning her affections, being the one that gets to love her and make love to her - maybe one of these days she'll wake up alone in her shitty apartment. Maybe she'd deserve that. Because really, what does she have to offer? How was she the one to end up with that privilege? Deep down, she knows her touch contains more love and respect than anyone else's could. That's all she has to offer. She makes sure to show her that every single time.

And instead of that, somebody hurt her and used her like she was garbage. Took something beautiful that only they were supposed to share, and turned it into horror and pain.

She wonders what Maura endured more of - fear or pain. Each answer is worse than the other.

_Stop._

Squeezing her eyes shut doesn't stop the tears from escaping.

Jane has always liked to think of herself as Maura's knight in shining armor. Nothing has ever made her happier in her whole life than proving to Maura, again and again, that she'll always be there for her. That she can trust her and rely on her for love and inclusion and protection - whether that means opening doors or taking bullets.

It hurts twice as much to know that Maura is aware of that sentiment, and shares it. Because she'd been in distress, and she must have been looking for her knight to come save her.

Her knight had not come, this time.

The armor doesn't shine anymore.

She'll sit here all night, picking off one link of chain mail at a time and throwing it down the bathtub drain.

_You put your arms around her every night like a promise you're gonna protect her. _

_Promises you can't keep are just lies. You lied to her. __So you can't do that anymore._

_She trusts you to protect her and you didn't. You lost that privilege._

_The time she really needed you, why couldn't you be there?_

_Now you have the nerve to go with her everyplace, like she's not safe unless you're there? Your sorry ass is the one that couldn't protect her in the first place. It's your fault. _

_And like she isn't hurt enough, now she has to deal with this fucking pregnancy, too. __She must be so scared and there's not a damn thing you can do to help._

Jane curls up on her side, sobbing uncontrollably into a towel to muffle the sound because she has no strength left to keep herself quiet.

Her sobs are so long and so deep that she's left gasping for air in between, almost retching. She notices some carry Maura's name. Her ribs ache.

But somewhere inside her, there's a tiny flicker of light, saying _bring it on_.

In a way, she welcomes this. Not only because she thinks she deserves it, but because she can sort of convince herself that this is Maura's actual pain. Pain she's bearing instead of Maura.

_She asked you to help carry this. __The more you carry, the less she does. _

_However much pain you're in right now, that's how much pain you're taking away from her. That's how it works._

_She's in there sleeping. She hasn't even been very upset. Maybe she gave the pain to you. Good. Good!__  
_

_Bring it on. Gimme some more. Gimme all the fucking pain you can possibly be in. I want it. No pain left for her if I have it all._

_Good. Cry harder. Hurt more. More._

_Sleep, Maura. __I'll carry it. You sleep and dream about happy things. You j-_

"Jane?"

Startled, she flinches, banging her elbow on the porcelain with a loud thud.

"Ow, shit- sorry." She clears her throat.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you." Maura's voice is thick. She's standing in the doorway, silhouetted by very dim light coming in from the guest bedroom window.

"Sorry I w-woke you up." Even in the dark, it'd be impossible for Jane try to hide that she's been crying, but she at least tries to sober up a little. She sits up, her head leaning back against the tile wall, wondering how long Maura's been there.

_Crap, I wasn't saying stuff out loud, was I?_

"May I turn on the light?"

"Better if you don't." Jane answers. "I m- if you w-want."

Mercifully, the light stays off. Maura comes closer, feels for the edge of the tub and sits down on it.

"You don't have to hide from me, darling," she says softly.

"M'not hiding. I'm just... don't wan-na bother you... go back, I want you to get some rest," Jane insists in a thoroughly congested voice.

"You're not bothering me. It's okay to show me."

"No it's-s not... nots-s-up-posed.. m'not your problem please go back.."

She's read every word about this on the entire internet by now - support tips, what to say, what not to say, how to be helpful. 'Don't rely too much on the primary survivor for emotional support', several websites warned. It makes sense. It isn't that she doesn't want Maura to know she's upset; she just doesn't want to give her the extra burden of having to console her. All Maura needs right now is peace and rest.

_She's hurting enough, don't add to it. And it looks like you can't handle it and she'll regret telling you._

"No, you're not my problem. You're my Jane."

Jane's almost completely out of strength to keep it together, and Maura doesn't seem to be leaving.

_Well, she's smart enough to know what she's signing up for. If she _wants_ to see this shitstorm, fine._

They sit in silence for a minute, save for the heaving, huffing breaths that Jane can't fully silence.

"Maur, can... does your brai-brain... remember stuff you hear while you're s-sleep?"

"Well.." she thinks. "I've seen a recent study assert that it is _possible_.. though not at the level you're probably referring to... why, what did you hear?"

There's a long pause while she wonders whether she should say.

"Please don't shut me out," Maura asks gently.

Jane bites her cheek.

"Did you call me? For help?"

There's another pause while she figures out what she means.

"No."

That's a tiny relief. And it must be true, Maura can't lie. She just hopes there isn't a loophole. She's way too tired for there to be a loophole.

"Why don't you come back to bed," she suggests softly.

She shakes her head, even though Maura can't see it.

"Don't deserv-ve..."

"What?"

"It's like ly-ying.. to..."

"..What's like lying?"

Jane spends a minute trying to steady her breath.

"Y'know the most... my favorite thing you ever said to me?" she says unevenly. "Besi-sides you love me, I mean. You sa-aid at night, how you feel safe with me.. and every night... every night I lay there until I feel you f-fall asleep and I'm thinking... how thankful I am you feel like that and I'm just promising over and over I'm never gonna let anybo-dy hurt-" she cuts herself off with a sob, sliding back down the porcelain. "And I have no right... you trus-sted..."

"_Trust_," Maura reaches down into the tub to find her shoulder. "I _trust_ you, Jane. Present tense."

_Should she trust you? You let her get hurt._

"I let 'em hurt you," she whimpers. "I didn-n-nkeep you safe..."

"You didn't 'let' anything happen, you were unconscious_._ And that was because you fought so hard to keep me safe, don't you remember?"

"I should've b-been smarter- could've fought bet-"

"You fought well. I know you fought your hardest."

"Bw-wasn't good enough," she bites her lip. "Bottom line is. You got h-hurt. And no.. nobody came to help you." She shudders.

_You should have stopped this_

_You could have stopped this_

"You _did_ come to h-" Maura tries, catching contagious tears.

"I didn't keep you safe," Jane curls up tighter, hugging her knees, out of strength to even press that balled-up towel to her face. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

"Jane, no -"

_Your fault_

_You shouldn't be letting her see this. This is hurting her more, right now, and that's your fault too_

"I can't help it," she wails in response to the accusation in her head. "I cant.. I'm sorrymsorrymso sorry..." she sobs, loud and deep and lurching. "I'm sorry-"

_Your fault_

"Jane, I'll be alright, it's not the end of the world," she tries to soothe her, stroking at her hair. "It's not y-"

"Mym-maura..." She wraps her arms around her own throbbing head. "You h- m-my Maura and I di-n't help oh God, please..."

If Maura is still talking, she can't even hear her. This must be the hardest Jane has ever cried. If she could just cry a little harder still, she could curl up into a little speck and disappear. She tries to. "_I'm sorry I'msorry..._" Big hot tears spill across her face and dangle by her ear, until they're cold and ticklish. She doesn't wipe them away. She's glad for the tiny irritation. _You deserve it._

"Shhh, Jane, it's not-"

"-_didn'tky-y-safe_... _lemme do it over_, _please..._" she begs. She's not sure if it's out loud anymore. If it is, it's in a more hoarse, pitiful whimper than Maura probably ever thought Jane's voice could reach. _"PleaseGod lemme do it over please I'll do it right... makeitme ple-heaseI'msosorry...please.."_

The fingers stroking at her temple still for a moment, and withdraw. Jane doesn't even have strength left to hate herself for scaring her off.

_"..please..."_

She hears Maura move, but then fingers return to her hair again. She must have just moved to sit down on the floor, hanging one arm over the side of the tub.

Not all the sniffles in the bathroom are her own.

It takes a few more minutes, but Jane finally quiets down. Because she knows she wasn't just sobbing nonsense; she actually meant that with every bit of her heart. If she wakes up tomorrow and it's a rerun of that day with their places traded, she'll truly welcome it. That ball is in God's court now and there's nothing more she can do.

"_That's okay, Jane,_" Maura whispers, smoothing over her hair while her last sniffs run out. "_It's okay."_

Jane lies there exhausted, just alive enough to keep breathing, puffy and stuffed-up and numb.

She stares at her closed lids, black, and opens her eyes and stares at the wall of the tub in front of her, practically black. Pure black. Clean and blank and safe. No longer a projection screen for horrors. Just black.

"Come on to bed, Jane," Maura finally urges quietly, wiping the cold streaks from her girlfriend's face. She probably knows what Jane is thinking, even though she hasn't said any intelligible words for quite some time. "I need you to fall asleep with. Maybe you don't think so right now, but I need you, okay? Come soon, please, and keep me warm. I love you." Jane hears a kiss and then fingers touch to her cheek, transferring it, before she hears her get up and leave.

Despite feeling almost comatose, she sits up immediately. Nothing but a jumble of cold, aching bones, scratchy eyes and hair stuck to the half-dried tears on her cheeks.

Taking a deep, final breath, she climbs out of the tub and returns quietly to the bedroom. Not because she feels worthy or qualified - only because Maura has asked her to. And she has no business saying no to Maura for a long, long time.

She drops herself wearily on her side of the bed and sits there, staring at the night light.

Cloth drapes around her shoulders, and soft hands help guide hers through sleeves. She'd been numb to how cold she was, until now.

"Jane, do you want to know how I got through it? While it was happening?"

Her eyes close._ No. Please no, I just got the black clean again. _"How?"

She hears the soft rustle of sheets behind her as Maura gets settled in bed, and then a light touch beckons her to join. Maura doesn't continue until her head is resting in its proper place, the crook of Jane's neck.

Jane places her arms around her, but it's a loose embrace, really in body only. They don't deserve to be there. _You're lying again._

"I closed my eyes... and I thought of the nicest, happiest, safest thing I know. And that's just what I told you, that night. That's being home with you... here in our bed, all wrapped up in a big cozy ball. Reminding myself that.. before I knew it, it would all be over, and you'd be okay,... and we'd be home."

Jane's eyes close, letting the pillowcase soak new tears directly from her lashes.

_That's what she meant when she said that._

"And we were. You held me so tight, and it was just like I needed. You gave me that to come home to. You made it real. Every time you do that, you're making that safe place I needed to come to, _real_. That isn't something you've lost the right to do - it's something I love and need from you now more than ever." Maura burrows closer in between Jane's arms, trying to nudge her into doing it right, doing what she always does. "_Please be home, Jane_," she whispers, _"I want to come home now."_

It hurts so much to hear that Jane whimpers out loud. She feels a fresh kind of guilt for making Maura ever have to ask for that, and vows never to leave her wanting it again. _I'm so sorry._

Tentatively, reverently, like Maura is made of delicate glass, she places shaking hands around her shoulders. Her fingertips roam slightly over silk pajamas, soaking in the sensation of her warmth. It's so comforting. Why does she feel like this is the first time she's touched Maura in years, when she's only been gone from this bed an hour? She buries her face into soft hair and inhales deeply. This is coming home for her, too. The scent sends her halfway up to heaven before that rope of unworthiness tied around her ankle reaches the end of its tether.

But she realizes that choosing to keep wallowing in guilt would be rejecting Maura's forgiveness, and denying her needs. That's nothing more than putting herself ahead of Maura. That's selfish.

She cuts the rope.

Her arms slide around Maura and lock tight. She wishes they could stretch and stretch enough to wrap all the way around her two or three or four times over, and hold her so tight that no one could ever pry her away.

Pleased, Maura snuggles closer, getting situated in their proper embrace.

"I'm so sorry," Jane sighs, calmly, sadly, honestly. "For everything." She kisses the top of her head. "I love you."

"I love _you_. Very much." Maura's words and lips brush Jane's neck.

Jane sheds a few more tears, silently. But she knows Maura still feels it. She feels Jane's every heartbeat, every breath like it's her own.

Right now, Jane can't imagine having the strength to wake up in the morning - which is not far off - let alone face a full workday. Sleep comes just after she decides there isn't enough time left for it.

* * *

_A/N - SIGH. __This won't be the only sad scene, but if it helps, I think it's safe to say this was the longest and most intensely sad one. So that's behind you now._

_Reviews always appreciated._


	11. Years Gone By

_Thanks for all your feedback on the last chapter. That was one of the pieces of writing that I've poured the most of my heart into, ever, so it's nice to hear that it affected so many of you. Sorry for the long wait.. I needed a mental health break and sorta lost my writing groove. :)_

* * *

_Chapter Content: General rape tw still in effect, just for overall topic of discussion, but not awful like the last one._

* * *

One hand silences the alarm clock, and the other slides across the sheets at her side. It finds nothing, not even warmth.

Jane comes downstairs to find her mother and girlfriend together on the couch, talking in muted voices. She senses instantly that Maura has told, at least to some degree, what had happened last night. Normally she'd be annoyed if Maura shared that sort of thing, but she can't really blame her for this one. If it helps her to confide in someone else, Jane is glad she did so.

Last night had been cathartic, and she feels a little lighter for it, though also a little guilty for putting Maura through it.

"Morning," she announces her presence scratchily, and the other women look up.

"Oh, good morning, Jane," Maura smiles. She looks a bit tired, but actually happy to see her.

"Hi baby," Angela greets her with a particularly sympathetic glance, rising. "Here, sit. You look like you could use a nice cup of coffee."

"Uh. That'd be great, thanks," she blinks as her mother passes to the kitchen. Taking advantage of the moment of semi-privacy, she sits down next to Maura.

"Hey. I.. I'm really sorry about last night," she says quietly. "I never meant for you to have to deal with that."

"I came to you because I wanted to," Maura reminds her. "_I'm _sorry for making you feel that way..."

"No, no. _That_.." Jane points accusingly in no particular direction, "_that_ son of a bitch made me feel that way. Not you. You've got nothing to be sorry for. And.. if it helps at all, that's the only time I've been like that."

"I thought so. You do tend to bottle up your feelings... not that I've helped. I don't think I've asked you even once how _you're_ doing."

Jane shrugs it away. "Don't worry about me, I'll be okay. You're all I care about."

Maura reaches out to take her chin in one hand, and tilts it towards her with a slight frown. Jane knows she's examining the few faint pinkish dots underneath one of her eyes.

"You broke capillaries," she murmurs, leaving out_ from crying so hard_.

"Bar brawl, if anybody asks," Jane pulls her head back with a weak smirk, looking over to see a pot of coffee brewing in an empty kitchen. She wonders whether it's possible that her mother actually went away to give them some privacy.

"Listen, Jane, I gather that you're putting a lot of blame on yourself. And I don't want you to. It's totally unfounded. Not a single element of what happened was your fault. I'm sure you do know that, logically. Don't you?"

"I know it wasn't my fault it _happened_. But that doesn't mean I don't wish I could take another crack at stopping it."

"I know." Maura puts a hand on hers. "Just, let me state for the record. I don't blame you, I'm not disappointed with you... I don't love or trust you any less. Nothing of the kind. Truly. So please don't beat yourself up, okay?"

Jane nods.

She will stop (for the most part). Not because she can consciously decide to feel blameless, but because beating herself up wastes energy that could be better used on Maura.

"You know.." Maura continues, "as much as it hurt to see you like that... it did also make me feel loved. I already knew that you cared about me, you tell me and show me all the time.. but I've never been shown in that way before. No one's ever... well, I suppose I never expected anyone to care enough about me to be _able_ to get that upset. So don't feel too badly about me seeing you like that."

Jane isn't sure whether Maura intended for that sentiment to be heartbreaking.

"Well.. I'm gonna work on finding some better ways of showing you. And, same goes for you - you can show me your bad stuff, too." She takes a long pause to decide whether it's okay to ask, "Maur... when do _you_ cry?" She expects Maura would be shedding a hundred times more tears than she is, but she never sees it happen. Besides that first night, she's only seen her cry briefly once, and maybe come close a couple other times. She must be incredibly good at hiding it. "I'm sorry I'm not there with you, when you do. Although I guess you'd let me know, if you wanted me there."

"It's not that I don't want you there.. I just haven't _had_ a really big cry. I don't think I'm actually feeling as much pain as you're empathizing."

"How's that possible," Jane accidentally voices her thought.

"Well, it'd be impossible to tell for sure. Although neuroscientists _are_ developing a technique for objectively measuring pain intensity from fMRI brain scans..."

"Mkay, we're not getting MRI's to tell us we're sad, I'll take your word for it."

Maura smiles.

"You know how I told you I spoke to a therapist? That's actually one of the reasons I wanted to. Of course I'm _upset_, but... I thought I'd be much _more_ upset. Some other women seem completely devastated... but I just.. don't. Maybe it's because I have so few 'unknowns' to fear. I have a complete understanding of my situation medically.. I have the most loving and understanding partner to rely upon, excellent financial standing, access to the best health care... no fear of my attacker returning..."

Jane wonders how accurate that last one is. True, the actual perpetrator is dead, but she doesn't feel too peachy about his accomplice still being on the loose.

"I certainly have some memories I'd rather be rid of, and some more still to be made as a result, but overall.. I'm very aware of the fact that circumstances are not nearly as bad as they could be. I'm just not completely sure whether to view that outlook as good, or _too_ good."

"What'd the therapist say?"

"She said it was healthy of me to acknowledge the possibility, but also to be careful not to disregard my actual feelings in favor of ones I _think_ I should be having, since there's really no such thing as a 'typical' reaction." (_I coulda told you that._) "I truly don't think I'm trying to suppress or or minimize anything... I spoke about it honestly and in detail," she shrugs. "It wasn't pleasant or easy, but I did it. I don't know, maybe... maybe being a cyborg has finally come in handy," she smiles weakly, re-purposing one of Jane's frequent jokes.

Jane curls an arm around her and eases her closer.

"You're not a cyborg," she mumbles in the midst of a kiss to the temple. "Well, look, you're really smart, and really strong - we know that already. You've been through all sorts of crap before, and taken it really well. I guess it's not impossible that you could just be taking this well, too?" Jane shrugs, although the notion sounds pretty idiotic out loud. "It can only be a good sign that you were able to talk about it, right? I mean, what more are you supposed to do?"

"I suppose."

"And by the way," Jane adds, "it's okay to talk to me about it, too. I'm not asking you to - just, if you ever feel like it, I'm always here to listen, K?"

Maura gives her a look that's appreciative but also says _yeah, right_. Considering how badly Jane flipped out last night with no details at all, it's understandable that Maura isn't keen on sharing much more.

"No, I'm serious. I _want_ to hear every word you wanna say. I don't want you to feel like you should spare me anything. Even if it hurts. I can take it. That's what I'm here for. That's what would hurt me most - to think you're keepin' something painful to yourself just to try to protect me."

Maura gives her hand a squeeze.

"I hear you."

* * *

Work that day isn't as awful. Even though they're not very productive, Jane is in a little better frame of mind and can actually focus on her job. She takes only one break from her work just to visit Maura - who, thankfully, has a more settled stomach than yesterday. She wants it to stay that way.

As the clock rolls over to 5:00, Jane is already riding the elevator downstairs, patting her pocket to double-check for the scribbled grocery list she's spent every spare moment of the day composing. She puts her phone on speaker to make a call as she starts her car's engine.

"Hey, Ma, what'd you used to do about morning sickness?"

* * *

40 minutes later, Jane walks into the kitchen with two paper grocery bags, finding her mother busy cleaning Maura's already spotless oven.

"Hi, honey. Maura's upstairs. Did you get everything?"

"Almost everything. I was gonna check another store for the rest, but I figure this is plenty for tonight."

Angela walks toward the stairs to send up a shout, "MAURA, JANE'S H- oh!" she nearly collides with a startled Maura just rounding the corner. "Sorry."

"That's okay. I heard the door," Maura smiles, immediately notices the bags on the counter. "Hi, what's all that?"

"I Googled a whole bunch of stuff today about what's supposed to help morning sickness, and the veteran over here had a couple suggestions," Jane nods toward her mother. "I'm sure you know all about it already, but I thought I'd pick up a few things to try."

"Okay, start eating a little something before you even get out of bed," Angela jumps right in with instructions. "I used to keep a box of soda crackers on my nightstand. Did you get those?"

"Yeah. And I got peanut butter crackers, they said those are good too, to get a little protein in there. That's easy to keep on your nightstand, if you wanna try that, I dunno," Jane narrates as she takes out boxes of crackers and a 6-pack of ginger ale. "Sour candy, no idea why, but I saw some people sayin' that helped..." She doesn't mention the specialty pregnancy suckers she saw on Amazon, which she didn't order because by the time they arrive, Maura may not even be pregnant anymore.

"Oh, gimme the lemon," Angela reaches, and her daughter digs out a small bottle. "This is the best. Maura, I carried around lemon extract in my purse when I was pregnant with the kids. When I'd be stuck next to some lady with a gallon of perfume that was turning me green, I'd just smell my lemons until I could get away." She unscrews the cap and takes a whiff, smiling fondly. "Aw, that reminds me of being pregnant."

Maura catches her contagious smile.

"Smells can trigger very strong nostalgic memories, partly because the olfactory bulb is part of the limbic system, which processes emotions and memory."

"..Right. I got your limbic system some peppermint tea... kept seein' people say raspberry leaf tea, too, but I couldn't find any. Um, some of those little disposable toothbrushes, those are nice in case you.. yeah... and they always say ginger is supposed to be good for settling your stomach, I pretty much just got everything ginger I could find..." Jane unpacks ginger snaps, gingerbread and a bottle of ginger capsules along with some chicken, and folds up the empty bags.

"Chicken is a morning sickness remedy?" Maura raises an eyebrow.

"No, but it is an ancient hunger remedy. I couldn't remember if we had anything for dinner. So.. yeah, and if there's anything else you know of that helps, I think I can get to the store and back in like 15 minutes. Maybe 10 with sirens."

Maura smiles at the small pile of purchases around her, looking touched at Jane's overkill.

"Thank you, both. That's very sweet," she smiles.

"I dunno if there's anything specifically very sweet about not wantin' you to barf, but you're welcome."

"You know.. I'm not feeling bad right now, but I would enjoy a ginger snap or two... I haven't had one in ages."

"Girls, I want to talk to you," Angela says, helping herself to a ginger snap after Maura opens the bag. She goes over to the couch, sits in the middle, and pats the seats beside her. "Come sit."

Jane is a little apprehensive about what might be coming as they join her.

"Now. I know you two are both strong, but I also know you're both taking all this harder than you're showing. And I want to tell you that this can turn out okay."

"We know, Ma," Jane nods.

"Yeah, but I know a little more about it than you think. Everybody knows somebody who's been through something like this. Unfortunately."

"Considering approximately one in six American women is a victim of sexual assault, it _is_ statistically likely," Maura adds. "Are you saying you know someone? Else?"

"Somebody from the old neighborhood?" Jane guesses, unable to think of any candidates she's currently acquainted with.

Angela answers, with a long pause, "Yeah. Me."

_"What?"_ They gasp in unison, mouths open.

"I never planned to tell you that, but considering what you two are going through... it seems silly not to."

"Oh my g-wait, when was..?" Jane sputters in shock.

"Oh, _years_ ago. You kids were tiny. And yes, I. Am. All. Right." She pats each of their knees solidly.

Rather than getting very emotional, Angela is acting almost like she's showing off an old scar. And that's exactly why Jane is having trouble gauging how to respond - hearing this news is like she has just added a new scar to her collection. Not a fresh wound, nor its healing process, but literally skipping right to a long-healed old scar. She feels weird to be reacting more calmly now than she did to the same news from Maura, but her mother's attitude just isn't calling for a big outburst.

"I... God, Mama, I'm sorry..." pulls her into a hug, meeting Maura's eyes behind her back like _What do we do?_

Maura places a hand on her shoulder, signaling that she wants a hug too, once they're done. "I'm so sorry, Angela."

"You won't tell anyone? Especially not your brothers. It's not that I'm ashamed, I just.."

"Course not," they promise.

"Have you _ever_ told anyone?" Maura asks.

"I never went to the police. You didn't go to the police with everything, back then. I only ever told Frank. He went crazy, he went out looking for the guy, saying he was gonna kill him. He wouldn't do that, he was just angry," she clarifies for Maura's benefit, "but I think he would have beat him up if he found him. I was scared he was gonna get arrested. But he took good care of me. That's one thing I'll say for him, he did bend over backwards to take care of me after that. Maura, I'm sorry you really only know about the bad part of Frank.. I guess you really never met the man I considered my husband. He didn't used to... anyway." She shrugs her way out of the tangent.

"Jane's shared a lot of nice memories about him," Maura assures her.

"I can't believe.. all these years, and you never..." Jane shakes her head.

"It was hard. But it gets better. Maybe so slow at first that you don't even notice for a while. But all of a sudden you'll look up and realize some time has passed and you've actually had your mind on something else without trying. One day you just catch yourself laughing again. You can't rush that, it just happens. This isn't something either of you will ever forget, but it won't always hurt like it does now."

Angela's thumb brushes over the back of Jane's hand, and they both glance momentarily at the scar there.

"You know..." she smiles at Jane in thought, "I remember sitting in our kitchen, braiding your hair.. over and over - I used to do that when you were still little enough you didn't fight me off - and thinking about what it'd be like if you were a person. You know, if you were all grown up and we wouldn't just be a mother and a baby, but two people, and you'd be somebody I could talk to about things. I wondered if I'd ever tell you that. But you looked up at me and... how could I ever explain such a thing to that little face?"

Just this once, Jane allows her mother to give her face a light squeeze with no groaning, squirming, or sharp remarks. She wishes she could say she remembers the day being described. There honestly aren't a whole lot of anecdotes about her being sweet as a child; she honestly hopes her little self was a nice distraction for her mother in the wake of such an awful situation.

"I still see that little chubby face when I look at you sometimes," she smiles. "But anyway, I'm telling you that so you'll know, when I tell you this can all turn out okay, I do know what I'm talking about. And I say _can_, not _will_. Cause it does hurt less with time, but it doesn't just magically turn completely okay between you two without you having to do anything. It's like.. oh, a broken bone. It can heal even if you don't take care of it, but it might heal wrong. Right, Maura?"

"Right."

Jane marvels at the restraint that must have come with such a brief answer.

"It was a blessing that I had Frank, and that you two have each other. I can't tell you how important it is to lean on each other. Because the farther you go out of your way trying to protect each other, or not bother or not worry each other, the more you just.. _stay_ out there, far apart. So, you," she says to Maura, and points to Jane. "See this girl here? She acts like a sourpuss sometimes, but she's a softie really. And loyal. She'll go to the ends of the earth for the people she loves, and she loves you like I never saw her love anybody. Don't be afraid to ask her for help. Even with little tiny things, because you'll find out those really add up in the end."

"I won't," Maura promises with a smile.

"And you, you see her?" she refers Jane to Maura. "I haven't known her as long as you, but I haven't seen a minute yet where she wasn't kind and understanding and brilliant. I know you think she just needs your help right now, and she does, but you need her help too. This isn't a one-sided thing. Sometimes what really helps you is getting to help somebody else, so you gotta allow her that. Let her help you through things, like always. Don't hide from her."

"I won't." Jane knows she eventually would have had a big cry anyway, but trying to shield Maura from all her feelings really had made last night so much worse. She's willing to heed any advice that'll keep it from happening again.

"Thank you for telling us that," Maura says sincerely. "It really means a lot. And if you'd ever like to talk more about it, I'd be glad to."

"Me too."

"It feels kind of good just to tell someone, actually," Angela says, though she shakes her head slightly, declining their offer at least for the moment. Taking a deep breath, she pokes Jane's knee. "See, I can too keep a secret."

"You certainly can. Jane smiles gently at her mother with sympathy and awed respect. "Jeez, I always knew you were strong, but... I never gave you enough credit..." Her mind is just beginning to whiz through a massive archive of memories, searching for clues and signs from her childhood. She can't imagine the strength it must have taken to get through that almost all alone, plus with a family to take care of.

Once again, there's so much more that she wonders, but doesn't think she ought to ask now. Maybe not ever. Certainly not while her mother's smile is so clearly addressed to her chubby little face.

* * *

_A/N - I was already a few chapters into this story when I decided I should do something more substantial with Angela than just the rabid-Catholic-buttinsky shtick. __I think there must be so many silent survivors among us who we don't even know about - especially older generations, who were more often taught to just keep quiet about things. The majority of my family are the type who would never say a word if anything like that ever happened to them - so how do I really know it never did? I got a chill when that thought occurred to me, so I decided to weave it in. _


	12. All Clear

Jane remembers this same scene from not too long ago. The two of them sitting side-by-side in matching uncomfortable plastic chairs while Maura filled out a clipboard full of medical forms.

That other time, Maura had taken a folded-up piece of note paper out of her purse and referred to handwritten notes. It had been a minute into that before Jane had realized she was crying. Assuming she feared the operation, Jane had been about one second away from tearing up the forms, throwing Maura over her shoulder and carrying her out, telling her to keep her kidney and screw everybody else. But when Maura had raised her head, she saw that her tears weren't quite ones of fear.

"This is the first time I've ever had anything to write on this page," she had sniffed with a strained smile, and Jane had looked down to see the heading, FAMILY MEDICAL HISTORY. Hope must have just informed her of her biological history in order to facilitate the operation. And Jane had ached for every time Maura's heart must have broken as she signed her name at the bottom of one of those still-blank pages.

This time, Maura has memorized all the information that she paid a kidney for, and she does not cry while she writes it.

The waiting room is uncomfortably cold. Just as cold and silent as the morgue, which they're both used to, but somehow here it's sickening. Shivering only makes Jane more nervous, and she can only imagine how it is for Maura, who has to change into a hospital gown when they graduate to the small exam room. She has her blazer off and ready to put around Maura the moment she's finished changing.

"But you're cold, too."

Jane levels a _really_ look at her, and she gratefully tugs it tighter around her shoulders with a quiet, "Thanks."

They sit very close together and she slips an arm around Maura while they wait, hoping to keep them both warmer.

"We shoulda brought your Slanket," Jane smiles, trying hard to act calm and suppress her shivering.

She wins a sniff of laughter from Maura.

A glance at her watch shows that their would-be lunch hour is almost over. Jane had asked Cavanaugh in advance for an extra long one for today, explaining simply that she needed to go to the doctor. Had he challenged her, she'd been prepared to deploy the word "gynecologist", which would have instantly ended the conversation (and probably prevented any future conversations for a long while), but it hadn't come to that.

Fortunately, they aren't kept waiting very long. Jane struggles to listen carefully to what the doctor says, because she actually doesn't want to hear any of this at all. She just wants it overwith.

For the most invasive part, Jane keeps finding herself tense and gritting her teeth as if she's the one receiving the exam. She stays decidedly North of the equator and out of the way, neither wanting to see anything nor assuming Maura would want her to. As repeatedly promised, she holds Maura's hand the entire time, although it's probably doing more for her own comfort. She sweeps a thumb back and forth over her girlfriend's fingers, but doesn't try to say anything soothing. Jane isn't sure whether she's just being brave or doing her Dr. Isles thing in order to get through this, but either way, she doesn't want to bring her mind back in case it's succeeded in escaping.

The ultrasound looks like absolutely nothing but static to Jane, but apparently it means something to the doctors. The sound of their voices fades out as Jane chooses one of the little dark blips on the screen to narrow her eyes at.

_Is that it?_

She isn't thinking of it as anything except a tumor. Isn't that all a tumor is? A few extra, unwanted cells?

_I hate it._

It's a microscopic, poisonous little tumor that she wants to hurry and get out of there before it spreads.

She doesn't even know whether she's directing her hatred towards the right blob, but she won't ask. It doesn't really matter.

_Look what it's putting my Maura through. __I hate that thing. __I can't wait until it's out of there._

Jane isn't sure what would be the length of a normal one of these visits, but she gathers that this one is abbreviated. The doctor is aware of Maura's plans to terminate, plus Maura already knows most of the information that women generally come to this appointment to find out. There is no talk of birth or babies.

Tests will still have to be finished, but Maura looks healthy and the pregnancy is deemed, by all appearances, low-risk, meaning Maura will be able to get on with her plans.

"And now that's overwith," Jane tries to smile with some optimism, giving Maura a quick, tight hug after the doctor leaves them alone. "You did great."

She offers a small smile in reply, handing Jane back her blazer as she goes to change back into her clothes.

"They should give you a lollipop, at least. Wanna pick up a treat when we get outta here? Anything you want, how 'bout it?"

"No, thank you." Maura looks like her mind is still somewhere else.

* * *

_"Jane?"_

"Hm?"

She opens her eyes in their dark bedroom, Maura shaking her.

_"I thought I heard something," _Maura whispers._  
_

Jane pats her arm urgently, _"Up," _her other hand already closing around her gun grip.

_"__It could have just been Bass, but.."_

_"Okay," _Jane whispers calmly, not wanting to upset Maura and get her overwhelmed. _"Get your phone, get your button." _

Maura's phone is on her nightstand as always, but it takes a moment of rustling in her drawer for the panic button.

_"Got it."_

Always concerned for her safety, Jane had finally convinced Maura to beef up her home security system right around the time they started dating. (It had taken a full hour's argument for her to agree to let Jane pay for extending the system to the guest house.) She's glad for that, although right now, no amount of security seems adequate.

_We should have put in a panic room and a moat with electric eels._

The fact that the alarm hasn't sounded doesn't dull Jane's response one bit. Even if it is a high-end system, Jane will never put her total trust in it, and even if she did, she would never treat Maura's report with anything less than the utmost seriousness.

_"Where did it sound like?"_

_"Downstairs? I'm not sure."_

Jane tugs her toward their bedroom door and listens in silence for a moment.

_"Okay. Stay calm. Quiet. No lights. Lock the door, don't open it before I come back,"_ she instructs.

_"But what if you g-"_

_"Do. Not. Open it. Press that button if you think you need to, but do not open this door for any reason. I love you._" She gives her girlfriend a firm kiss on the head and slips through the door along with an echo of her last words, and waits to hear the lock click behind her.

Jane had said that wanting to make Maura feel more secure, but she knows the flimsy bedroom door wouldn't do very much to keep someone out if they really wanted in. A single well-placed kick could do it.

_We're replacing that door tomorrow. Every door in the house._

As silently as possible, Jane systematically checks each room with her flashlight readied alongside her Glock. She knows the layout of the house in total darkness; she'll only turn on the light to identify and/or blind an intruder.

Though her heart is pounding, she isn't exactly afraid. She has already mentally mapped the best routes for searching and clearing this house before. That's one of the things she's trained to think about in any new space. She already knows which rooms to search in what order, which directions to approach which doorways, which areas to avoid being backlit by windows. This is her element, her territory. She doesn't feel cornered and defensive; she feels more like a tiger on the hunt.

Maura must be getting more scared by the minute, wondering what could be taking so long. Knowing this could potentially be a life-or-death situation for them both, Jane has to give this her all. No rushing, no skimping.

When every inch of the house is cleared, Jane finds herself almost, _almost_ a little disappointed that that son of a bitch they've been looking for wasn't in here, and that she didn't get to shoot him. But she's incredibly relieved to return to the bedroom door, saying "All clear."

The door opens before the words are all the way out of her mouth, and she's pulled immediately into Maura's arms. She lets out a huff of adrenaline.

"Ohmygodwherewereyou do you know you've been gone almost twenty minutes how do.."

"I was being careful."

"I didn't even get to _tell_ you to be careful," Maura laments, her voice shaking.

"Well, I was anyway, see, cause I knew you'd say that," Jane assures her, going to put her gun and flashlight down on the nightstand and clicking on the light. "I didn't see any signs of entry, but what'd you hear?"

"I don't know. I don't know. I'm not even sure I didn't just imagine it."

"Okay. Well, Jo's awake lurking around the kitchen," she reports. "It could have been her."

"I'm sorry I woke you up like that for a false alarm," Maura apologizes, almost panting. "Ugh, the alarm didn't even go off, what was I thinking..."

"No no, you did right. You did just right. Never ignore anything, even if you're not sure. I want you to tell me _any_ time, hear me? Even if we're not at home. If you don't feel safe, you tell me."

"I was so scared.."

"Nobody's down there," Jane takes her by the shoulders, trying to soothe her. "Nobody's gonna hurt you."

"No, I mean you! You went right out there... you might've never come back.."

"I gotta protect you."

"You'd die protecting me," Maura says unsteadily, examining her eyes. "You really would."

"Gladly."

Maura's face takes a few seconds to contort from fear into anger, and she pulls out of Jane's grasp.

"Don't _say_ that," she says louder, in frustration. "Don't- dammit, Jane! don't always act like you'd _die_ for me the same as you'd give me your coat! It's your _life_. You only get one chance! What _if_ you died for me? Then what?" she demands.

Jane just stares back, stunned at how suddenly the mood just changed.

"Then I get to be alone? Then I get all the time in the world, alone to think about my brave, _dead_ girlfriend? Don't you dare ruin me and then leave me alone!"

Her voice is sharp and unstable, like the way an animal snarls when it's afraid instead of angry. Jane knows that a lot of this is due to the rush of nerves. She's seen it happen lots of times, especially as the first responder at crime scenes - adrenaline flows, people get jittery, curse, yell, ramble, lose their cool. It's not hard to understand. But while adrenaline may be responsible for the delivery of these words, it can't totally invent their content.

"Ruin?" Jane repeats quietly, devastated. "I ruined you?"

"No, I.." Maura sighs, putting a hand to her forehead. "Not _ruined_, I just... you made me so I can't be without you. I was strong when I was.. empty. If you keep people at a distance, they can't hurt you... I let you in so close, and... and it's the best decision I ever.. no, it wasn't really a decision, it just happened.. and it's great, but it's terrifying. Anyone else, even if I liked them a lot... I still kept a space for myself. A little contingency plan I kept for myself in case they left, so I knew I'd still be okay alone... but not you. You're in _all_ my space. I don't have a contingency plan for you. I wouldn't know _how_ to be alone anymore. I've never not known how to be alone."

Jane is cut off before she even begins to reply.

"And don't promise me you'll never leave me. I'm not talking about the kind of leaving you can control. You're the best at what you do, but you can't control everything, so... so don't promise me you'll never leave. That'd be easy for you to just _say_, you'd never have to look me in the eye and deal with it, because you'd just be gone. And the last thing ever between us would be a broken promise..."

It's getting hard not to cry.

"I've never promised you that," Jane shakes her head. She has specifically made sure never to say that, for exactly those reasons. "I couldn't, you're right. I won't make a promise I don't have the power to keep. But.. what would you have me do instead, Maur? See you in danger and just.. just stand back and _let_ something happen?" She asks, her voice raw but gentle. She's not arguing. "You know I can't do that."

Maura paces a few steps, doubles back, and lets out a huge breath. For a minute, she just stands there with her hands on her forehead, and Jane has no idea what to do. Finally she seems to let go of something and steps forward into Jane's space, into arms that welcome her automatically.

"I know," she exhales, slumping. "I know you can't."

She's decompressing. Jane squeezes her tightly.

"If it helps at all, you've ruined me like that, too," she tries, putting a smile in her voice and praying it doesn't just upset Maura all over again. "Scares the hell out of me. But I wouldn't have it any other way."

"Nothing could hurt me worse than being without you. Please just try to remember that, next time you're trying to protect me from something?"

Jane nods, although they both know it's not going to change a thing. It's really not negotiable. Not even if she weren't just hard-wired to be that way, not if she had time to think before acting.

Maura pulls her down for a kiss. It's not until now that Jane consciously realizes they haven't shared a real kiss - more than a peck on the lips - for weeks.

It strikes a spark and the adrenaline still coursing through Jane's body is like gasoline. She knows Maura isn't ready for this to go very far, but oh lord, is she enjoying it while it lasts. They stand at the side of their bed, holding each other and kissing deeply, almost desperately, like it's the last time they'll ever get to.

But Jane is prepared to stop immediately when Maura hesitates, which indeed happens before too long. Although Jane doesn't harbor even a shred of resentment about stopping, she also can't help but think that what would've come next probably would have been legendary.

"Jane, I don't.."

"I know," she says gently, not wanting Maura to have to explain herself. She just invites her back into another secure hug, sweeping a hand up and down her back. "I know."

* * *

A/N - Canon Maura somehow isn't in the habit of keeping security real tight around her house, is she? I wondered if she even has a burglar alarm. I can't believe she wouldn't, though that time her TV got stolen suggests she isn't A+ about using it, if she does. I can't believe Jane wouldn't make her tighten up security. I can't believe Maura would need to be _made_ to tighten up security.


	13. L'heure Bleue

"These are all ugly." Maura stares with distaste at the selection of doors.

"Well, these aren't the only options in the world," Frankie says. "But, y'know, something along these lines."

Jane smiles at him while he's looking at Maura. He's a good brother to come with them to the Home Depot on his day off, and even more so to be patient with Maura's indecision. She loves him for the way he's just completely accepted her as another sister.

"We're not _really_ replacing every door in the house, are we?"

"No," Jane assures for at least the third time. "But I would like strong entries. And if it was up to me, the bedroom door. I did not feel as secure as I'd have liked to last night, with you up there."

"What about just installing a stronger lock?"

"Sure, but the actual door's as important as the lock. Hollow core interior doors like that are zero security. You could put ten deadbolts on it, and it won't stop you from kickin' right through the wood."

"And we really oughta beef up the door frame and strike plate, too," Frankie points out. "Strong door's not worth much if it's attached to a crap frame. Remember when Paddy paid you a visit? It was your door frame that busted, not the lock."

"But you reinforced it, didn't you?" Maura asks.

"Yeah, but it'd be even more secure if it wasn't, y'know, half glass."

The brothers had repaired that door for Maura - with Tommy enduring constant remarks from Angela, thinking he had been the one who'd broken it. It's a little stronger than it was before, but Jane still worries about it. Frankly, she's still in disbelief that _seeing_ her door get kicked in hadn't affected Maura enough to make her want to tighten up security on her own.

"What's wrong with the front door?" Maura tries. "That one's solid. And the back door is, too."

"Yeah, those are decent. Well, there's still the sidelights on the front, though. That's not the strongest, if you wanna get technical."

"So you would like to remove _all_ tasteful entryways on our home and replace them with big ugly bomb shelter doors," she clarifies to Jane, with the beginnings of a confrontational facial expression.

"...Uh." _A little bit? _

If safe equals ugly, Jane is fine with it being hideous, but Maura obviously doesn't share that opinion.

"Windows are also weak points, no?" she continues. "Would you like to have those removed? We could reconstruct all the walls from solid stone, with balistrariae."

Obviously this is not a real question, but brother and sister still exchange a glance, each checking to see if the other knows what that word means. For a moment, there is nothing but the sound of distant beeping from somewhere in the store.

"What?"

"Balistrariae. Slits cut into the walls of castles and fortresses, for archers to shoot arrows. Or in our case, small arms fire."

"Oh... yeah, no."

Maura sighs, shifting her weight and looking around. This must be the first time they've ever been shopping where _Maura's_ the one who wants to leave. She decides against making a joke about it.

"Look, if you hate the idea, we don't have to," Jane shrugs. "It's your house."

"It's our house."

"Yeah, but it's _your,_ our house."

"No, it's just _our_ house."

"Heyyy, you guys work on that.." Frankie says, backing away, sensing an argument he doesn't need to be a part of. "I'm gonna.. go.. look at a thing."

"It's not that I _want_ it to be ugly," Jane explains. "I know it sounds like overkill to you, but I just want it to be safe. To be honest, I have no idea why you wouldn't want that, but I'm not gonna try to insist on something you don't want."

"It's... it's not all about appearances," Maura says, walking a few steps to the end of the aisle. She goes to lean against a post but thinks better of it at the last second, probably fearing getting her blouse dirty, and just stands there with her arms crossed instead.

"Hi, need help finding anything?" another man in an orange apron asks Maura.

"Thank you, no," she dismisses him politely.

Jane smirks secretly. Three employees have offered her help; this makes eight for Maura (nine, counting the guy who walked by again to ask if she was sure). Half of her wants to go on a tirade about just because a woman is wearing Gucci and heels doesn't mean she's helplessly lost in a hardware store; the other half doesn't blame them one bit for trying to find any excuse to talk to her. _She_ sure would.

"I suppose my real objection is that it sort of feels like a defeat to have to change the house at all, even if it's to something equally aesthetically pleasing," Maura confesses. "I'd feel like we're redesigning our home and rearranging our lives out of fear... you know what I mean?"

"I get that," Jane nods.

"But it's your home too, and I don't want to prevent you from making your own home into one that you feel safe in."

"Honestly? I'm never gonna feel _totally_ safe in any house. I just feel like if there are easy things we can do to make it saf_er_, it feels weird not to do 'em. Okay.. how about we leave the entries, and just do our best to reinforce 'em. And maybe you could shop around a little online or something and _if_ you see something you actually do like, we could think about replacing that side door?"

"Fair," Maura nods.

"K. What do you think about the bedroom? I'd really just like to have that one extra safe room to keep my valuables in."

"What valuables? You never let me buy y- oh." she finally interprets Jane's look to mean she's talking about her, and smiles a little. "... Jane?"

"Hm?"

"I think I should apologize for my behavior. For scolding you last night when I should have thanked you. I can't honestly take back what I expressed, but I hope I didn't also make you think that... that those concerns at all negate my gratitude for the way you look out for me."

"Don't apologize," she shrugs it off with a smile, giving her hand a small squeeze. "I understand."

"But it's a terrible thing if I were ever to start taking it for granted. The way you care. That's not something I could ever beg or buy..." she looks at Jane's hand in hers. "Do what you think is best for the bedroom."

"Not if you don't wanna change it." Jane didn't mean to inspire a guilt trip.

"I do. I want you to make it something you feel good about."

* * *

"K, Jane, hand me the drill."

It's nearly sundown by the time Jane and Frankie actually get around to reinforcing the back door frame with the hardware she bought, and have lugged a new door upstairs to put up later (not 'bomb shelter' grade, but one she feels much better about).

"Wait, you two should really be wearing protective eyewear," Maura warns from somewhere inside the house.

"Nah, it's fine," Frankie tries to stop her.

"No, wait, hold on!"

Jane sighs.

"You know we can just have this done by the time she gets back," he tempts.

"Yeah, but if a hunk of wood flies and takes out your eye I'm never gonna hear the end of it from her._ Or_ Ma."

"... And you would be so sad about my eye."

"Oh, yeah, that too."

"I have them! ... I mainly use these with my bone saw," Maura approaches a minute later, handing them each a pair of safety goggles, "but they should provide adequate protection for this."

"Thanks..." Frankie examines his with a frown.

"What's the matter?"

"You wiped off the brain hunks, right.."

"Oh, you know perfectly well that I maintain a very sanitary-" she stops when she realizes, now that he's chuckling openly, that he wasn't serious. Jane snorts. Maura gives his shoulder a light swat before she disappears back inside.

Maura had offered to help more than once, which Jane declined, telling her to go about her business instead. Considering she was never in love with this idea, she doesn't want her having to lift a finger or even watch.

When their work is finished, Jane comes back inside and notices that the wall in the entryway is blank. And although she can't name specifically what else is missing, a couple of other spots in the living room look unusually empty.

"We get a cat burglar, or are you redecorating?"

"I thought it would be nice to rotate out some of the artwork I have in storage, and freshen up a few corners of the house," Maura explains from the kitchen, pouring something out of the blender.

"Hm. Nice." Jane doesn't particularly care about art one way or another, but honestly, she won't terribly miss the picture that's always been there.

Maura steps over from the kitchen and hands her two small glasses of some greenish slurry.

"Carrot and spinach," she explains to her grimace. "Take one to Frankie. I'd like us all to have _some_ nutrients this evening, if you insist on getting pizza."

"Oh, don't act like you don't like pizza," she smirks, going to the back door where her brother is gathering up the last of his tools.

"Here," she offers him his share of the ugly concoction.

"The hell's that?"

"Puke."

"My favorite."

"Don't pour it in the bushes," she advises over her shoulder. "She always knows."

"Anyway, I've had some of these things in here for ages," Maura continues when she returns, gesturing to the picture of the two Ethiopian girls which is now leaning against the dining table. "I realized that in particular sort of reminded me of Ian. Maybe not Ian himself, but.. that time in my past. Not that I want to forget my past, but I want to move forward."

Ian is a funny subject - Jane is sure she ought to be jealous, but really kind of isn't. Not very. Anymore. She admits he wasn't entirely a bad guy (except for the part where he treated Maura unfairly) but his loss is her gain.

"What are you gonna put there?" Jane asks, deciding to skip the topic altogether.

"I don't know yet. I'd rather have some more things in here that reflect my present life. And you. Since this is your home, too, I thought you ought to have a say in the decor as well as the security."

"Ooh. Yes, well, for the dining area, we'll clear out all this stuff and wallpaper up one of those floor-to-ceiling photo mural things of Fenway..." she teases, striding towards the dining table and making sweeping gestures with her arms, before checking to see a lack of enthusiasm on Maura's face. They share a smile.

A handful of Jane's pieces of sports memorabilia have found their way into the decor, but the style of the house is still decidedly Maura's, and they both know it'll remain so. Honestly, Jane doesn't really care.

"Drink that," Maura reminds her of the smoothie ignored in her hand.

Jane knows it's useless to argue. She chugs it, trying not to taste it until the end, gagging slightly afterward.

"Oh, it's not _that_ bad," Maura takes back the empty glass.

Jane spies a few more unframed canvases on the table, and goes to pick up the smallest painting. It's covered partly with solid black and the rest with patchy gradients of grey, with the artist's tiny initials scratched in the corner. Maura's tastes are obviously more arty-fartsy, but a black-and-white painting of nothing seems utterly pointless.

"What's with this?" she asks, tilting it to show Maura.

"'L'heure Bleue'. A landscape painted and given to me by an old friend of my mother's."

".. 'Blue Hour'? What's that?"

"Very good," she praises.

Jane wants to be offended at how impressed Maura looks that she's figured out two common and phonetically obvious French words. _Maybe you play a little too dumb sometimes._

"The blue hour is a certain portion of twilight," she explains, "prized by a lot of artists because the quality of the light is so unique."

Jane frowns. She has no trouble picturing that time when the sky glows deep blue, but she is having trouble understanding why this totally colorless painting would be called that.

"And so... this friend was colorblind, or..?"

"No."

"Regular blind?"

"No. This man would go out almost every morning and night to paint the twilight. His favorite subject. Mother used to tell him that he'd drive up the price of blue paint, because it was practically all he used," she recalls, pausing her story for a moment to grab a baggie of mulberry leaves out of the refrigerator. "But he was bothered that he wasn't truly able to paint from reference, since painting in low light, especially with the same color, makes it very difficult to see the canvas."

"Did he try using, um.. a light?"

"I suppose a light would have disrupted the view," Maura shrugs, dipping out of view to lay out the leaves for Bass, but her voice continues: "The human eye can't fully adjust to high and low light levels in rapid succession. In order for vision to adjust from light to dark, total darkness has to be maintained while a photopigment called rhodopsin builds up in the rod cells - it requires 30 minutes or more to achieve full adaptation, so I don't think looking back and forth between a well-lit..." she rises, noticing Jane's adoring-but-bored smirk.

"So anyway, I went to the little set of paints my mother kept for me - I must have been six or seven - I got the tube of black, and gave it to him. I said, why don't you paint only the dark parts, and let the real light color in the rest. That way it will have no choice but to look exactly right when you hold it up next to the real thing. The adults tittered, humored me, and I felt a little foolish. But he tried it, and evidently it finally satisfied him, and he gave me the result in thanks."

"Huh." Jane takes a fresh look at the painting. Now knowing what it's supposed to be, she can define some of the black blobs as maybe hills and trees and stuff. "Is this of sunrise or sunset?"

"I don't recall his saying... I suppose it could be either."

There have been times when Jane's been so tired that, driving home in twilight, she genuinely had no idea whether she'd worked a little late and just missed a sunset, or pulled an all-nighter and was beating the sunrise back home.

"Hey, is it about that time..?" Jane twists around, looking towards the window. "Let's test this sucker out."

She steps out on the side of the house, and Maura follows. It's still a little brighter than would be ideal, but the effect is obvious.

"Well, look at that," Jane says, holding up the canvas. "That was pretty smart. You go, little Poindexter."

"Do you like it?"

"Yeah," Jane shrugs agreeably. "I mean, for the story." Aesthetically it's still kind of ugly, but it'll never fail to remind her of Maura.

"Let's hang it, then. Maybe by the bedroom window, so the light can come in."

"Yeah! And let's hang a broken clock next to it. Then they'll both make sense twice a day." Maura gives her a look, and she smirks in response. "Would you order the pizza while I round up Ma? And don't health us out on the toppings."

* * *

As she drifts closer to sleep that night, Jane's mind keeps gravitating to thoughts of herself and Maura as children.

She knows only one picture of Maura as a child. Cute, of course. Dressed up like one of those fancy dolls that are meant to be looked at but not played with. Pretty and perfect. She wonders what Maura was _like_, though. The only way she can imagine her is her same ultra-scientific, all-knowing self, just condensed into pint-size. Undoubtedly sensitive and quiet and sweet.

That's sure not how Jane had been. She'd felt like a gangly misfit for the first half of her life. No - actually, she'd felt perfectly okay about herself; she just felt _seen_ as a misfit by others. Never patient enough, clean enough, quiet enough, feminine enough, never interested in the things she was supposed to be interested in.

Maybe nobody can really accurately say what they were like as a child. Or maybe you're the _only_ one who can say what you were really like. She can't decide which it is. Jane doesn't remember ever being different than she is today. She's never really even changed her hair since her mother gave up arguing and let her grow it long when she was seven...

_Ugh._ Arguing with her mother. A staple of childhood. She wonders how many times she pushed the poor woman to her wits' end over some stupid petty thing, oblivious to the other unimaginable stresses she was already dealing with. It hurts to think about.

She wonders if Constance ever took comfort in Maura when she was having a rough day. Not that she knows Constance incredibly well, but she can't picture it. She wonders if little Maura was shy when she hugged her._ If_ she ever hugged her. If _anybody_ ever hugged her. Why does she get the feeling that was a rarity? Shame.

She smiles inwardly, thinking how much she would love to spend just a few minutes with little Maura. Maybe just to observe.

She looks down at her hands. She must have forgotten they were making a salad.

Maura knocks over a bottle of dressing and begins to cry.

"Hey, that's okay," she says, ignoring the spill and stepping forward to comfort her.

Only now she's addressing not a grown woman, but a small child, standing there with her little hands covering her face. Jane is already kneeling down in order to talk to her.

She doesn't even stop to wonder how that happened. Had Maura been little all along, and she just hadn't noticed? That must be it.

"It's okay," she says again, gently, holding her hands out to invite her into a hug. "C'mere, Maur."

Face still hidden, she moves forward wordlessly, coming to rest against Jane, and Jane can't help but smile when her arms close around her. She would love to pick her up. She does.

"Shh," she soothes, bouncing her softly. There's something so nice about being able to hold all of her at once. She places a kiss among fine blonde waves.

Once her tears dry up, Maura finally lifts her head, and Jane immediately breaks into a grin when she gets her first look at the adorably compact little version of the most beautiful face in the world. The colors of her eyes are so shockingly vivid, like the most magically picturesque day of autumn. It's not until now that Jane realizes everything else about her surroundings has been grey, like they're in an old TV show. Except for those eyes.

Maura looks down at the spill on her hands and dress, which has now gotten on Jane's clothes too. Bright blue. She looks back up almost fearfully, like she expects to be scolded. Focused on Jane like her fate hinges on Jane's response.

There's some blue on her nose. Jane moves forward, touching the tip of her nose to Maura's, transferring a dab, and then smiles, showing it off. Just to be a little silly. To show it's okay.

Maura takes it all in, big brain whirring with analysis. There's innocence but also intelligence in her eyes, so far beyond her years. Tentatively, a little smile grows. Like everything in the whole world has just gone from wrong to right. _T__hat little dimple! _Jane almost squeals.

"I love you," Jane murmurs, her own smile spreading even wider.

"I love you, too." It's startling that it's not a child's voice. It comes from the wrong place. Like somewhere off to the side.

Jane's eyes snap open. It's dark.

Oh. They are in bed after all.

"_Whu_-.. hm."

"Oh, were you just asleep?" Maura asks, somewhere between confused and amused.

"Guesso," Jane croaks, loosening her adoring hug around.. a pillow? _Impostor._ She pushes it aside in favor of the real Maura, hugging her around the middle and already drifting quickly back towards sleep, smiling. _"Hhmmm, you cute lil'shit."_

".. What?"

_"Hmmrghm."_

* * *

_A/N - No, that's not the entire significance of the title yet.__  
I was kidding about a Home Depot scene, but then it just kinda happened. Hey, I am going for domestic. I'm surprised canon Jane and Maura haven't argued in a Home Depot yet. And Frankie is doomed to be a part of every one of their home improvement projects forever. He just is._

_I've had this odd hunger for a Jane/Maura-meets-Maura/Jane-as-a-child fic lately, because the thought makes me squee, but I don't know how it would work. Maybe this will satisfy me. (If anyone wants to write a real fic of that, my heart will be yours.)_


	14. Quarks and Peas

_Chapter Content: Some talk of abortion in the last section, in case that's sensitive for anyone._

* * *

Monday morning, Detective Andrews finds Jane already sitting beside his desk.

"Is there something I can do for you, Detective?"

"I'd like to see the surveillance video," she requests.

He takes his sweet time sitting down and putting on his glasses before responding,"Do you have some new information that is pertinent to my investigation?"

"No..?"

"Then what is it that you expect to find in the same footage that I have already been through?"

"I don't know. I wouldn't know til I saw it, if anything. But it's been weeks, the trail isn't getting any warmer. I was _there_, after all, I thought it's possible I could have some insight." When he only stares back, she adds, "What'll it hurt? You're probably not real active on this case still, are you?"

She knows that it may have reached the point where there's little to do except wait and hope the off-the-grid suspect screws up and lets himself be spotted somewhere. Time is passing, and this case, though given its due attention, is moving further and further down the pile as new murders are committed.

"Need I remind you that I already have the suspect identified?"

"Yes. I realize that. Look, having this guy caught is.. kind of a big deal for me," she leans on his desk. It's the understatement of the year, but she doesn't want to explain any further to Andrews. "I can't stand to see this case just sit on the shelf and know that I didn't even so much as watch the tape. I'm not suggesting that I think you missed anything - just, maybe there's something that you wouldn't recognize. There very likely isn't, but I just want to _know_ that there isn't, so I can sleep at night. So could you please just humor me?"

Andrews looks at her and lets out a long breath that whistles through his nose. And then opens a file on his computer.

"Thank you."

She moves over his shoulder and focuses her attention on the incredibly grainy footage in the video player. It looks like just inside one of the entrances to the parking garage they'd been in. After a moment, a person in dark clothing moves diagonally across the frame.

Andrews makes a motion of finality with his hand as the video clip ends.

"And there you have it."

"..That's it?"

"That's it."

"Ok, how about the rest?"

"You're welcome to sit and watch the surrounding six hours of what is essentially a static image, if you are so compelled. But I have already been through it, and can tell you, that's all the worthwhile footage there is for you to see."

"You sent me a frame of the suspect's face, remember?" she points out, confused. "That frame didn't happen in this clip. I know there's more."

His nose whistles again, and she wonders what would happen if she just reached over and pinched it to make it stop.

"I didn't say there wasn't any more footage. I said that that's all there is for you to see."

Jane stares back.

"What do you mean? You just showed me this much, what are you try-"

"As I am not inclined to believe you would value my answer," he interrupts, "I encourage you to save both of our time and take this up directly with the Lieutenant."

"Good idea," she says shortly, heading straight to Cavanaugh's door. She lets herself in once her knock is answered.

"Morning, Rizzoli," he says, barely glancing up from his desk.

"Morning, Sir.. I'm hoping you can tell me what's the deal with Andrews givin' me some business about not being authorized to see the surveillance video on my own kidnapping."

His eyes come up again and stay.

"Why do you want to see it?"

She frowns, only restraining herself from a sharp '_really?_' because he's her boss.

_What is it with these people? Isn't it obvious?_

"I figure the case is going nowhere, I thought I oughta take a look on the off chance I might spot something. But the thing is, he showed me one piece of footage, but I know there's more and he won't show it to me."

"He's acting under my orders."

"Wh- so what's the big security issue?" she asks, getting confused at his behavior. "I know I'm not allowed to work the case, it's not about that, but I have every right t-"

"Rizzoli," he interrupts calmly, "You're not gonna see that video, and I don't owe you an explanation, but because I respect you I'm gonna give you one. It's my order keeping you off that video, but not my idea. It's Dr. Isles'. She requested that I make sure nobody sees that video."

"Well, I'm sure she meant nobody except me," she shrugs. She and Maura are each others' exceptions to everything, to the point where they've stopped having to say so when they make generalizations.

"No, that includes you."

"So you're saying Maura told you specifically not to let _me_ see that tape?"

"Yes. I agreed as a personal favor, out of respect to her."

Jane's face falls. It's the only answer that could have made her stop fighting.

_So, what, they had a little secret pow-wow in here? Why would she go behind my back like that?_

Her brow creases, as it finally dawns on her why Maura wouldn't want her to see that video.

"Oh, no.. was there a camera.. where we were?"

"Yes."

"So there's footage of.. _us_."

"Yes."

She takes a long blink.

Andrews has seen what happened to Maura. He's watched every second of it. It's his job. But she still wants to gouge out his eyes. No one should see that. It shouldn't even have happened, much less have an audience.

"Have _you_ seen it?" she asks. _Please say no._

"No. Look, she came in here and made me practically make a blood oath about you never seeing that footage. I think she spoke to Andrews about it, too. She didn't say exactly why, except that seeing it would hurt you, but it's not too hard to figure out what kind of footage she'd get that upset about. And judging from the way you've been acting lately, I figure we both know what we're talking about here."

She nods.

So not only does Cavanaugh already know what happened to Maura, he knew long before Jane did. There's something she really doesn't like about that.

"I don't think I have to worry about you fighting that restriction, do I."

"No," she says quietly, backing away. "No, I think that just about covers it."

"And, Rizzoli?" He pauses. "I'm sorry. For you both."

She quirks the corner of her mouth before she opens the door. "Thanks."

* * *

Either Maura's dinner of chicken and steamed vegetables is unusually bland, or Jane's still too bothered to taste properly.

Naturally, she understands why Maura wouldn't want her to watch that tape. She certainly wouldn't _want_ to, either. If she had known it existed, she would never have even asked in the first place. But she doesn't understand why Maura didn't just explain this directly to her, instead of going over her head.

It's not that she's mad. Even if she was, she couldn't air her grievances with Maura now like she usually would. She has immunity. But Jane _would_ still like to know.

"I asked to see our garage surveillance video today," Jane says simply, taking a bite and just sitting back to observe.

Her girlfriend's reaction is immediately nervous.

"I requested to Detective Andrews and Lieutenant Cavanaugh that you didn't see it," Maura says rather quickly, probably sensing she'll salvage some credit if she volunteers the information before Jane gets to it. "And I told them to go ahead and tell you I said so, if it ever came up, because I know you'd wage war if you thought it was a matter of departmental procedure."

Jane snorts faintly at her accuracy, pushing a little hunk of broccoli around her plate.

"True. But.. I don't get why you thought you couldn't just come to me. All you had to do was ask. I wouldn't have gone behind your back and still tried to watch it. _Especially_ knowin' what's on it."

"I know," Maura says, setting down her fork and looking a little remorseful. "I met with them the first day back to work, while you were still at home recovering. At that time, I was still considering keeping this whole thing a secret. And I thought that even if you found out what happened, and found out that that footage existed, I just.. it would have hurt you so much if you somehow saw that, and I still liked there being that failsafe in case..."

_In case my word is worthless?_

"Yeah." Jane spears a carrot and examines it with disinterest before putting it between her teeth.

"Are you angry?"

"No. I mean.." she shrugs, "it's your business."

"But I can see that it bothers you. It's bothered you all day. You were unusually quiet at the autopsy this afternoon."

"Well, honestly, yeah, this was not the ideal way I would have preferred to find out, but.. it's fine. Just.. I dunno. Been keepin' it a secret from everybody, and here it turns out Cavanaugh _and_ Andrews have known all along.. it's just.. I didn't see it coming."

"You don't _have_ to keep it a secret."

"I haven't been exactly itchin' to send out a department-wide memo."

"Well, not _everyone_, ideally. But I know that you're under stress from all this, and you should be able to talk to your friends about it. In fact, I'm sorry if I've denied you that support system all along.." Maura frowns as a sidenote off to herself, "_did_ I ever specifically ask you to keep it a secret, or did you just..? Anyway. I'm fine with your brothers or your partners knowing, if you'd like to confide in them."

Jane files that away, but she doesn't think she will. It's not much longer before Maura's appointment; they're in the home stretch. She's gone through probably the worst part already without telling, so she might as well stick it out.

* * *

Dull smacks fill the room as Jane's fists connect with synthetic leather.

Behind her, the door slides open.

"Hey."

"Hey."

Maura sits down cross-legged on the floor mat several feet away, placing a water bottle beside her.

Jane gives her dummy a few more straights to the face, and then looks back to see Maura reaching for her foot, stretching quietly. It seems like time to wrap up.

"Did you want some peace and quiet in here?"

"Oh, no," Maura shakes her head. "Don't stop for me."

"Eh. I've had a decent workout," Jane says, stepping back and taking off her gloves. "Been in here 20 minutes, I bet."

"Almost 40," Maura corrects, her eyes then making it clear she didn't mean to say that out loud. "I just wanted to, um.. it's okay to be angry, if you are," she says meekly. "You do tend to box when... and you're _allowed_ to be, by the way."

"I'm really not," Jane shrugs. "Just.. felt like burning off some general funk."

"Oh."

Jane pauses to wonder if she's been boxing a lot more than usual, lately. And if Maura interprets every workout as redirected anger.

"Speaking of exercise and stuff- and I can't believe _I'm_ saying this to _you_, but - d'you feel like goin' for a little jog tomorrow? Or something?"

"I thought you hated jogging," Maura says, switching legs and stretching the other.

"Well, yeah, but I miss jogging with you. We haven't gone in a while."

As a matter of fact, besides stretching and a little yoga at home, she hasn't really seen Maura do anything like exercise since before their kidnapping. Never having loved jogging itself, Jane had been so glad for the break in schedule that she didn't even get suspicious about why, at first. Now knowing, as surprised as she is that Maura doesn't insist on keeping at least a minimal exercise schedule, she can't exactly expect her to have a lot of pep.

"I know," Maura smiles a little. "I really should. I just have so little energy lately. Just _thinking_ about going out for a run is exhausting... and then a nap sounds so enticing instead."

"Gotcha. I feel like that all the time, anyway. But I know you really need your rest."

Something twinges in Jane's chest, as she worries she's gone too close to the topic. It's a little odd, trying to be supportive of a pregnant woman yet also walking on eggshells not to mention babies or children or pregnancy or anything. Every time she must say something in reference to Maura's pregnancy, she has to second-guess herself, making sure it's not one of those tired old pieces of regurgitated advice that actually refers to what's good for the baby, and that the comment makes sense in terms of Maura's health only. It's not that Maura has forbidden it, or would even get upset about it - it just _feels_ like a misstep.

"And _you_," Maura picks up her water bottle and extends it to Jane, "need to hydrate. But really, don't stop your workout on my account. This is your exercise room."

"Yeah, but it's also your tranquility meditate-y yoga room," Jane points out, dropping herself on the floor next to Maura, "and I don't think you're gonna achieve nirvana with me makin' a racket."

Maura's eyes leave Jane's to make a brief but thorough tour of her body.

"Maybe I came in here to watch you make a racket," she smiles.

"Oh?" One corner of her mouth curls a little.

It's clearly the cue for a kiss. Jane wonders what to do. She hasn't initiated a kiss with Maura lately, because Maura understandably hasn't been in that mood, and she's not sure it doesn't look insensitive to try.

_Quit overthinking, idiot.__ She's making her kiss-me face, so kiss her. It's not rocket science._

But by the time she's decided, Maura has already leaned forward and kissed her.

"I might take this over nirvana, anyway."

Jane chuckles and scoots closer for another kiss, Maura running fingertips across her collarbone.

* * *

Jane sits on the living room floor, leaning against the foot of the couch, too lazy to get up though her tug-o-war with Jo ended 10 minutes ago. Instead she has pulled her laptop off the coffee table to do a little aimless snooping online about a case.

On the couch above, Maura turns sideways to put her feet up and relax. With 3 autopsies, it's been an especially tiring day for her.

When Jane goes to bookmark a page, she notices her browser has accumulated several other bookmarks about different physicians, abortion, and pregnancy, from times when her laptop gets borrowed.

Even though she's had a doctor more or less chosen from the start, and her appointment is already made and fast approaching, Maura has been taking advantage of every spare hour to research. It's not that she seems nervous - it's just what she does.

They've spoken about it surprisingly little. Jane has offered repeatedly to help if she can, but it feels stupid, considering they both know she pretty much can't. Not when she knows next to nothing about this, and as much as she could hurry and try to learn, Maura would already know 100 times as much (and more accurately).

Mentally, Jane still likens Maura's condition to some kind of tumor or illness instead of a baby, because it's never going to _be_ a baby. In all her other experience, pregnancy equals babies and family drama and rattles and squealing. Baby brothers, baby nephews, baby neighbors, baby John Does. It occurs to her that she's never been very close to anyone who had an abortion. As far as she knows.

She frowns, counting on her fingers.

"Hey Maur... what was it you said we were waiting for? 6 weeks?"

"More or less."

"But... the appointment's day after next. Don't we have to wait 2 more weeks for it to be 6 weeks?"

"No, this _is_ 6 weeks."

"But.." Jane frowns. "How are you 6 weeks along if... if it's only been 4 weeks?"

"The _fetal_ age is 4 weeks, counted from the date of conception. But gestational age is counted from the date of the last menstrual period, which is generally about 2 weeks earlier."

Jane rolls this idea around her head for a moment and spits it back out.

"That makes no sense, but okay."

"There's a slightly higher risk of an aspiration being incomplete if it's done very early," Maura explains for at least the fifth time.

"I bet. It's gotta be so tiny. Like.." Jane pinches two fingers tightly together, "a quark."

"The ovum alone is vastly larger than a quark," she smiles, too literal as usual. "As a matter of fact, did you know it's the largest cell in the human body? Potentially large enough to see without the aid of a microscope... anyway, by this time, the embryo is probably about..." she holds up her own fingers at a more accurate distance, "Like a... pea. Like a little green pea."

Jane blinks. "That big? Already?"

"M-hm. Development is quite rapid at this stage."

"Huh."

Jane gets lost in thought, letting several quiet minutes pass.

"Hey, you hungry? What do you wanna do for din..." she trails off when she sees that Maura has dozed off. She's been doing that more and more, lately.

She looks at her girlfriend's hands clasped over her stomach, gently rising and falling. It's far from showing anything, but she knows it's in there. That little speck that's turning their lives upside down.

Except it's not a speck. It's not some microscopic, theoretical _entity_ anymore. It's a pea.

_What's going on in there?_

Opening up a new tab, Jane finds a website offering a detailed weekly pregnancy calendar.

She cringes at the first words on the page, 'Congratulations, Mommy!' and scans down to the more useful-looking information.

**WEEK 6: Baby's heart is circulating blood; starting to grow ears, nose, eyes, and lips; may be starting to wiggle buds that will become hands and feet.**

Jane's eyes widen.

_Wait, what? A face, seriously?_

_No, don't be stupid. It's just a teensy blob. It's not like it can _look_ like her or anything._

With a look of vague unease, she turns and stares at Maura's stomach for another minute.

_Pea._

She can't stop hearing the way the word 'pea' sounded in Maura's voice. And when you call it that, it just doesn't sound as... _sinister_.

Of course, she's still looking forward to the day they get it out of there, like a weed they should hurry and pull before it takes root. But no matter what she tells herself, now instead of some black, cancerous speck, she sees it as a pea.

A bright green, shiny little... Maura-pea.

_You're way too visual._

With wiggles and a heartbeat.

_Fine. No big deal._

"_Hey, little.. pea.. thing,_" she hears herself mutter warily.

Suddenly she feels like she's just, without thinking, stepped up to a podium in front of a dozen cameras waiting for a press statement.

She has no further comment at this time.

* * *

_A/N - I confess I have no idea whether Jane would realistically be allowed to see that tape (as a victim), or to what degree detectives are supposed to keep stuff like that confidential from each other. On the show they can all pretty much do whatever they want, so.. let's just go with it :)_

_Crossing my fingers on the #-weeks-pregnant thing - I read and read and I'm still confused. I will welcome your corrections if I've made a mess of it._


	15. This Is It

_Chapter Content: This will be an emotional one._

* * *

This day has come so quickly. Or maybe the wait has felt like a decade. It seems like both.

Maura isn't supposed to eat before the procedure, so while she takes her morning shower, Jane sneaks a bite in the kitchen. She doesn't have much of an appetite, but she needs to be strong today for Maura, and an empty growling stomach won't help.

Today is going to suck. Plain and simple.

When her mother knocks at the door, she's not sure whether she appreciates the company, or wants to scream.

"Hey, Ma."

"Hi, baby. How's it going?" she asks in a hushed voice.

"Okay. So far. She's in the shower."

"Oh. I wanted to be sure I see her before I leave for work."

Jane stops herself from questioning her motives; her mother hasn't tried to push any beliefs onto Maura so far, so there's no real reason to be a suspicious jerk about it right now. It's nice of her to care for Maura like another daughter.

"Has she talked this over with you very much?" Angela asks.

"Not really," Jane shrugs, crossing her arms and leaning against the refrigerator. "I mean, a while back she did. But lately, no, unless I brought it up."

"She hasn't talked to me about it at all."

"Shocker." At her mother's look, she elaborates, "Well, it's no secret that you're not exactly rootin' for her to do this."

"I kept out of it! I haven't said _one_ word about it this whole time."

"And I appreciate that. I do. But, y'know, it's still weird to talk to somebody about something you _know_ they think is wrong."

"I hope that's not all you two think is on my mind. It's not all about right and wrong. I'm a big girl, I can let go of that," Angela insists. "I worry about her getting hurt. Don't you? I mean, there are risks like with any surgery. She could never have kids again, or who knows what else."

"Course I worry, but she knows what she's doing. She chose a really good doctor. C'mon, if you were havin' brain surgery, you'd want Maura to be the one to choose the surgeon, wouldn't you? She's got this."

"I know," she sighs. "It's not like having a tooth out, though, even if it goes perfect. I don't care how normal she acts, or how much she wants this, she's going to think about this forever. I know nobody wants to act like it's a big deal, but it is. I worry about how sure she is."

"She's not stupid, Ma. She knows more about it than both of us put together. She wouldn't do it if she wasn't sure."

"I didn't say she was stupid. I just think it's funny she wouldn't talk about it more. I mean, normally when Maura's stressed out about something, she talks about it non-stop, since when does she get quiet instead?"

"That, I don't know," Jane admits, "but if that's what's workin' for her right now, then fine. I'm just glad it's finally time to get this taken care of. So it can't hurt her anymore."

"_It_ isn't the person who hurt her. You know that. It didn't choose to be there any more than Maura did."

Jane rolls her shoulders a bit irritably.

"Well, it's certainly not _helping_ her. And I don't care who chose or not. She doesn't want it there, so it's gotta go."

"I know you don't want it there either.."

"_Hell_ no."

There's a long silence. Angela turns around to wipe some invisible crumbs from the counter.

"Jane, do you _hate_ that baby?"

_Don't call it that._

"Yeah."

Jane tenses for some kind of confrontation, but nothing happens.

"I left something next door," Angela says rather abruptly, pushing off the counter and disappearing out the side door, almost convincingly covering up what Jane suspects to be the beginning of tears. If it weren't for her girlfriend coming down the stairs a moment later, Jane probably would have followed.

Without the routine of breakfast, Jane is somewhat at a loss for what exactly to do. Maura seems to be mostly within her own mind, so she doesn't try too hard to strike up any chitchat.

Angela soon stops back in on her way to work for a big hug and well wishes. Its genuineness seems to do Maura good.

Jane finds herself a little surprised when Maura goes upstairs to do some work, claiming she wants to save herself a little hassle come Monday. Probably the bigger reason is that Maura doesn't want to just sit around and think about herself for the next few hours until her appointment. Although Jane understands that, she's all jittery and sympathetic, and frankly kind of had her heart set on them spending the morning close to each other.

She stays downstairs, putting on the TV and flipping around the channels until she finds a baseball game, paying so little attention that it takes her over ten minutes to realize it's actually football. It doesn't matter.

"I couldn't focus."

Jane looks up, startled. Maura had reappeared in the room so silently that she didn't even notice her in her peripheral vision.

It reminds Jane of the times she used to creep out of bed as a child. She'd hear her parents watching TV in the living room and it sounded so much more fun than laying there in the dark and waiting to fall asleep. So she'd crawl in there and watch Johnny Carson, laying on her belly right under the arm of the couch where they couldn't see her.

"That's okay," Jane says, scooting over and patting the space. "You shouldn't worry about work today anyway."

Maura sits next to her. Close, but separate. Like they used to. Like two people on a bus.

The space between Jane's arms feels painfully hollow. She wants to give a hug. A back rub. Something. She carefully places her hand so it's available for holding, but Maura doesn't even close the distance for that.

They end up sitting there quietly, unable to bother busying themselves with any pretense of activity while the appointment approaches, not even pretending to listen to the TV.

Maura doesn't totally look like herself. Maybe it's because it's so rare to see her in 'loose-fitting, comfortable clothes' (a hunter-green jogging suit she bought just for the occasion) or maybe it's just the blank-yet-tense look on her face. She's gone light on makeup and her unstyled hair is in a loose ponytail (now isn't the time to point it out, but Jane thinks she looks extra cute that way). Her posture is rigid, as if she's just about to stand up and leave, except she stays still as a statue as an hour rolls by.

Jane can't blame her one bit for being tense. _She_ could explode with nervousness, and nothing's even going to happen to her.

"How're you doing?" she asks. Even though her voice is gentle, it seems to rudely shatter the quiet, like talking in church.

"Alright," Maura answers colorlessly.

Covertly, Jane glances at her watch. It's an hour before the appointment. Maura had said a few times that she wants to be at the hospital at least 45 minutes early; normally Jane would roll her eyes right out of their sockets, but her job right now isn't to complain, it's to make sure everything goes exactly the way Maura wants.

"Got about an hour," she says.

Maura nods. "We should go." But she makes no move. After a minute of apparently unnecessary readiness, Jane sits back again.

Though Jane gives no more alerts, Maura does the same thing near the 50 and 40-minute marks.

While Jane is glad it's finally time to get this done, it's certainly not a happy occasion, either, so she would hate to have to prompt Maura to get up for real, if they wait until the last minute. She tries to look more relaxed than she is. It's taking conscious effort not to bounce her knee or wring her hands.

Jane's been waiting eagerly for this day, and yet now that they're finally about to go get this taken care of, it's hard to be quite as gung-ho about it.

Something strikes her. Something she'd like to say. Well.. not really _like_ to, but... should. Kind of. And not really _say_, either.

_You'd only be pretending that thing could hear you if you talked out loud, anyway._

_So, um._

She doesn't know what she's supposed to say to a tiny blob that has no way of even knowing she, or itself, exists. And she has no idea why she feels like she owes it any kind of comment. But it just sort of seems like she ought to, if for no other reason than that this is her last chance to do so. In an hour or two, it will be gone. It's just so final.

_Well... so long..?_

Nervously she glances at Maura, then goes back to staring at her stomach until some words come.

_Bye, pea._ Her lips move almost imperceptibly.

_So, uh. I know all this wasn't really your fault. Technically._

_I mean, I still hate you. _

_But... I guess it doesn't really make sense to blame you for what happened. __So... yeah. Just for the record._

_Um. That's it. So.. ok. Bye._

Maura's eyes are already on hers when she looks back up, probably wondering what she's looking at.

"I'm really sorry you have to do this."

Maura receives the comment with a small nod. "At least it's a relatively simple procedure."

"Still." It's so infuriating - not only that someone hurt her in the first place, but instead of at least getting to start healing and putting it behind her, she's had to wait to go through _this_ now. "You said the actual thing only takes like ten minutes, right?"

"Normally."

"Plus a little time for signing papers and stuff, resting awhile... could be home probably by 1. And then you can just relax... we could watch your solar system thing you've been waitin' to see? Just think, it won't be long before you'll be right back here, with all the boring planets and naps and backrubs you can handle." She smiles encouragingly.

Maura releases a tiny, wistful sigh. It's a comforting thought, but it can only help so much.

"We ought to leave now," she says again, actually rising this time, and they step out into the world with no fanfare.

The weather is beautiful, which seems downright inconsiderate.

Every time Jane looks over during the car ride, she expects to find Maura with some tormented, thousand-yard-stare, but she looks completely neutral, the same as she has all morning.

For the fifth time, she glances in the backseat to make sure she brought the bag. The one with all the stuff they said to bring - plus the Slanket, and the iPod with the _Suite Bergamasque, _one of Maura's favorites, which Jane secretly called ahead and got permission to play quietly during the procedure.

When they arrive at the hospital, Jane parks and unbuckles her seat belt, but makes no other move, waiting until Maura does.

This is it. They're here.

Maura is just looking at the glove compartment, like she hasn't noticed they've stopped.

_What must she even be thinking. I wish she'd say something. I wish I could say something that'd help._

"Y'know I'd take this for you in a heartbeat if I could," Jane tells her quietly.

Maura's eyes rise to hers and really look into them for the first time all day. The corners of her mouth are touched by a feeble but genuine smile.

"Thanks, Jane."

Unable to bear the distance any longer, Jane leans over, inviting her into her arms, and thankfully she accepts for one last, tight hug before they go.

"It'll be over soon. You're gonna do great."

Maura nods as they separate.

It's silent for a minute. Jane finds her hand and squeezes it lightly, not sure what else to say.

They're only early now by 10 minutes. Jane will let her wait out every single one, if she wants to, but it's unlike her to stall even for something she's dreading.

_Maybe Ma was onto something. Maybe she_ isn't_ completely sure. _

_Wouldn't hurt to ask._

"Are you having any second thoughts?" Jane asks gently, trying to give her an easy out.

"Well.. there _is_..." Maura mumbles, "always more I..."

"Hm?"

"Other physicians, and... techniques I could've.. and.. it's like this came so fast.. did it seem fast to you?"

"Kinda, yeah. Why? Was it too fast? Do you want some more time?"

"No, I.. I've prepared all I _need_ to.. probably, it's just.." Maura's voice shakes a little, as she rubs her knees anxiously and looks out the window at the hospital, "well, I certainly haven't .. I don't know, weeks ago I thought that by now I'd.."

Maura has spent every spare moment of the last month researching, deeming her final choices of hospital, doctor, and technique the best available. Jane had even checked out the doctor's background, just to be sure. Everything has all been set for quite some time. This is the very first hint of hesitation so far.

"Look, if you'd feel better taking some more time, we could just reschedule," Jane suggests. "It's not like this is the _only_ day you can ever do this."

"That _would_.. no... no, I should just do it," Maura says, shaking her head. "I'm nervous, but I have to just get it overwith. I'm this far."

"But, wait though, there's nervous and then there's not ready. Are you not ready for this?" Jane asks, concerned at her girlfriend's responses. "'Cause it's okay if you aren't."

Maura closes her eyes, then squeezes them shut.

A minute passes.

"I need a push."

"Huh?"

"I've never been... isn't it funny, I wasn't scared about my kidney, and that was a much more serious..." she gives a hollow smile, then forces her face straight again. "I just need you to push me."

Jane's stomach disagrees with this idea. She shakes her head gravely.

"I'm here to _support_ you. A million percent. But I'm not gonna _push_ you. Nobody's allowed to push you."

"You w.. it's not like that, it _would_ be supporting, that's what I meant.. I just... I've come this far, I'm _right here_," Maura gestures toward the building, "I just need a little nudge. I _would_ like to reschedule. I _don't_ feel ready. Okay? But let's be realistic, am I ever going to get _more_ ready? If I run away now... I'll.. I'll only have to come back and... the longer I wait, the more complicated..." she unbuckles her seat belt, seeming to have to will her fingers to actually let go of the strap, like she's halfway up Mount Everest and giving up her only safety line.

"But, hang on, whoa, I _don't_ want you to force yourself to go in there. Not yet, not if there's still even _one_ more thing you can do to feel more ready," Jane insists. "Even if you _are_ as ready as you're ever gonna get, maybe today's just not the day, maybe you'd be in a better frame of mind some other day, I dunno. If you've got that little feeling in your gut tellin' you _no_, you gotta listen to it, even if you don't know why. Maybe it's some.. Twilight Zone thing, maybe it's nothing, but it doesn't matter. I want you to be a thousand percent sure that this is what you want, that you've got the very best doctor, that you know exactly what's going on, and that you're completely ready."

"It.. but there's..." Maura sits for another moment, her breathing getting more and more shallow. "I'm not..."

When she looks back to Jane, her eyes are full of outright panic.

_Uh oh, something's-_

Before she can say anything else, Maura has flung open her door.

Jane fumbles for her own handle and gets out as quickly as she can, hurrying around to the passenger side of the car, expecting to see Maura running. But Maura has only stumbled to her hands and knees and been sick a few feet away from her open door.

_Oh, God. Did this have to be even worse?_

Jane kneels next to her, making sure her hair is out of the way.

"I'm s-or-rry," Maura tries, embarrassed, "it c-ca-"

"Shhh, no, that's okay," Jane rubs a soothing hand on her back. "That's okay."

Her last coughs subside and she's left shaking with quiet tears, looking like it's taking all her strength just to stay propped up on all fours.

A couple of passersby begin to approach, looking concerned, and Jane raises one hand in an "OK" sign, which she hopes suffices as the universal signal for 'thanks but go away', angling herself a little to shield Maura from view.

"C'mere, Maur," she sits all the way down on the ground next to Maura and gives her a gentle tug, inviting her to collapse into her lap, and gathers her up in her arms when she does. "C'mere, sweetie. I got you." There isn't much Jane can actually do to help, but she's at least more comfortable to sit on than asphalt.

Maura buries her face in her neck and cries.

"I don-n't know," she sobs weakly, fingertips digging into Jane's shoulders. "I don't know, I don't kn-now-w-what to do.. I don't know what-to do-"

Jane squeezes her tight as tears start to roll from her own eyes. Having Maura clinging in her arms, crying in fear of something Jane is powerless to protect her from, is more agonizing than any physical torture she can recall. She doesn't think she's ever seen her this afraid, this undone.

"No. Okay, no way. Just, no. Look. I'm gonna take you home now, and we're gonna take some more time to think about it. There's _no_ way you're goin' in there like this. Even if this _is_ the right thing to do, this is obviously not the right time to do it. There's absolutely nothing wrong with changing your mind. It's okay. It really, really is."

While the sobs gradually subside, she just holds Maura tightly, rubbing circles on her back. She also doesn't let more than a few moments pass between scans of their surroundings. Even though it's bright and there are people around, a parking lot is not Jane's favorite place for them to be.

A car parks nearby and the old man who gets out notices them; Jane waves him away as well.

"Maybe that-t's the.." Maura finally looks beyond her girlfriend's shoulder, as if just remembering they aren't at home, but rather sitting on the ground in a semi-busy parking lot. "Are people looking...?"

"Nah, it's just you and me. What do you say, Maur?"

"I think it's cowardly. To run away. I'll only ha-have to come back." She rests her forehead on Jane's shoulder again. "I want to sit on the couch with you. I want the planets and back rubs, but I didn't earn them, isn't that childish? Just leaving.. consequences.."

"Hey. Childish, really? Do you think it's fear that's keeping you from going in there? Chickening out? You think that's what this is? That's not it. I know you better than that. You're one of the bravest people I've ever known. Being brave doesn't mean you're not scared. I know you _are_ scared, but that's not the reason you're changing your mind. Fear is an emotion and emotion alone doesn't sway you. You looked at the _facts_, and you _know_ you aren't ready for this right now, and you're too smart to ignore that and force yourself into it anyway. I'm proud of you for respecting yourself. Don't you dare call yourself cowardly for that. I don't fall in love with cowards."

When Maura slowly raises her eyes, Jane smiles and nods reassuringly.

She sits, sniffling for another minute. She isn't still deciding. She's just letting Jane's words soak in, trying to believe them.

"I just want to be home," she says in a voice almost too small to hear.

"You got it." Jane presses a kiss above her ear.

* * *

While Maura freshens up and changes, Jane prepares them a little of the chicken soup which her mother left in the fridge. Neither feels like eating very much, but some warm food is a comfort. Maura eats, but isn't ready for words yet. Jane doesn't make her use any.

They make a nest of blankets and pillows on the couch as promised. With footage from the Mars rover playing quietly in front of them, Maura hides her face in Jane's chest and begins a cry that won't taper off until dinnertime.


	16. Sentry

_Chapter Content: A little rape tw. As usual, emotions rather than graphics. _

* * *

Both women had gotten Thursday and Friday off work, carving out a double-long weekend to allow Maura plenty of time to recuperate from her procedure and Jane the freedom to care for her.

Although they'd ultimately decided to reschedule it, the days off have still turned out to be just as desperately needed, because ever since they returned from the hospital, Maura has been crying more than not.

There's been no discussion yet, but Jane has gotten the distinct impression that it's not merely the abortion she's crying about. That was just the first crash that triggered a 10-car pile up. Apparently, she has not merely been taking everything remarkably well. It just hadn't fully hit her until now.

Relentless stress throws her morning sickness into overdrive, making her nauseous practically all day long, so she barely eats, which makes the nausea worse. It's a terrible cycle. She doesn't really talk, aside from brief responses when spoken to. Physically, she could almost pass for a victim of a nasty flu, and Jane would dance with joy if it were only that. The worst part is the part she can't see.

Jane feels awful, both sympathetically and physically; with her girlfriend's health and emotions so disrupted, her own have no hope of staying on track either. Her only solace is the fact that Maura prefers to cry with her most of the time, rather than locking herself away alone. She has no idea what to say or how to help, but holding Maura is one thing she's definitely good at, so she's thankful that that's even an option.

She goes back and forth between trying to, and trying not to comprehend what Maura might be going through. Sometimes she's strong, because maybe Maura needs that, but other times she doesn't even try to resist adding some of her own silent tears to Maura's. Maybe she needs that too.

Jane wishes there was more she could do to help than just hold her, but at the same time, she knows how much it can really mean to be held, especially at night; nighttime has a way of making good times better, and bad times much worse.

She remembers the few nights that Maura had slept over at her apartment in the wake of Hoyt's final attack. She'd wanted so badly to just roll close to her and snuggle up, but friends don't do that. Friends fall asleep side-by-side. Maybe close, but not touching. It had helped so much to have her close, but being unable to have her just slightly closer had been a mild form of torture.

The worst part had been the sense of dread that started to build when their conversations grew quieter and drowsier, until Maura inevitably fell asleep first. Sleep has always come more easily for her anyway, and although she didn't express it much, Jane is sure she took the incident much harder than Maura. When she would hear that distinctive, steady breathing that meant Maura had really fallen asleep, the rush of feelings would begin.

The tingling panic, the racing heart. The cold sweat and hot tears. Being in distress and having the cure three inches away, sleeping peacefully.  
The urge she had to reach out and rouse Maura, knowing she'd be genuinely glad to wake up and comfort her, but also the cruel logic that forced that hand back down, saying _No, let her rest.  
_The idea that waking Maura would have meant putting herself first, turned those three inches into 3,000 miles, and left her feeling so terrifyingly alone.  
The rest of the night became an unending, desperate attempt at telepathy as she stared at Maura's profile in the moonlight, brain screaming into hers, _please wake up, please wake up and be with me. _Because somehow, if that worked, it wouldn't have counted as disturbing her the same way as tapping her on the shoulder. But Jane wasn't telepathic, and Maura never heard. It felt like she was the only one awake in the entire world, like even the one she trusted most had gone ahead and left her behind, alone with the monsters.

The feeling may not have been very rational, but that didn't make it any less awful, and Jane refuses to let Maura feel it any time she can help. So, a new rule: no matter how tired she is, she won't allow herself to fall asleep first anymore, not even if Maura is having an okay night.

Thursday night had not been okay. Maura had unintentionally cried herself to sleep on Jane's lap on the couch at 9:30. But then she woke up at 3, crying quietly while Jane stroked her hair until she dozed off again, and this repeated at least a few times until she got up at 5.

Friday night is not shaping up to be okay, either.

Maura neither cries nor speaks once she climbs into bed. She's too queasy to toss and turn; she curls against Jane and stays still as a statue, like she's trying to fool herself into thinking she's already asleep. Although she's tired, she can't seem to ease her breath, can't slow her heart rate, can't quite stop trembling. She's tied in so many knots, and until some of them loosen, sleep will be out of reach.

For a night like this, Jane rules out sleep altogether in order to watch over her.

Whether Maura takes hours to fall asleep, wakes in the wee hours, or never manages it at all, she'll be there to keep her company. If Maura shows the stirrings of a nightmare, she'll be there to rescue her and remind her that she has never left the safety of her arms.

She begins the night by sitting up against her pillows, letting Maura get situated against her, and reading her a bedtime story ("Synchronization of polar climate variability over the last ice age") for as long as her tired eyes can make sense of the words.

And after she sets the journal aside and turns out the light, she cradles Maura's head against her heartbeat and starts whispering everything comforting she can think of, dropping tiny kisses on top of her head in between.

_"It's gonna be okay.  
____________You're home. We're safe and snug and warm. We're together._  
Relax everything. Loosen up your hands... your shoulders. That's it. Your legs. _Go limp. You don't have to be ready for anything.  
__Breathe with me. Deep in... deep out.  
__Listen to my heartbeat. Let yours line up with mine. Nice and slow. Nice and slow._

___________It's safe to relax. ____________I'll be standing guard.  
____________It's safe to close your eyes. ____________When you open them again, I'll still be here.  
__________________________________You won't be alone. __I've got you. __I'll never leave you behind.  
____________I love you, no matter what._

_I know your head feels heavy, full of troubles.  
But you're resting your head on me now.  
Let go of all that heavy, ugly, prickly stuff. Give it to me. I'll carry it until morning.  
I'll hurt your hurts and worry your worries for you. They won't know it's me.  
See how much lighter you feel when you don't have to carry anything.  
So light you could float away._

_Morning will come. Whatever comes with it, we'll face it together.__  
I bet tomorrow will be a little better. If not, that's okay too. I'll be there for you to lean on.  
__But we don't have to think about that yet. There's still plenty of time now to rest.  
____Just close your eyes. Just know that you're safe. And loved. And you're gonna come out of all this just fine._**_  
_**

_We made it through yesterday, and tomorrow isn't expecting us yet.  
__This is just space in between, just for us. All we have to do right now is relax.__  
__It's okay if you sleep. It's okay if you don't. Either way, __I'll be here.  
__I'll be here."_

Jane feels each and every second tick by.

By 3 in the morning, she's yawning and widening her eyes in the 4-watt glow of the nightlight to stave off sleep; this is more difficult than she imagined when she first set her mind to it. But Maura needs a safe place right now, and she is going to _be_ that place, no matter what it takes. She is Maura's sanctuary, her pillow and her shield, her trusted sentry. She will not close her eyes.

Eventually she's run at least five dozen times through all her little whisperings, and words are starting to run together and lose their meaning.

And then Jane, who has refused to ever sing a note in front of another human being in all her life, finds herself halfway into humming Brahm's lullaby. She freezes in between bars, remembering that one of the major problems here is pregnancy, and wondering if a baby lullaby is a huge, insensitive misstep.

But Maura, still hanging onto her last shred of consciousness, snuggles a tiny bit tighter against her, encouragingly. So Jane continues. Her notes are slow and quiet and faltering with drowsiness, but she knows it doesn't matter.

She finishes out her umpteenth repetition even after she's sure she hears that steadied breathing.

And she's left alone. Only this time, it's a victory.

4:18.

Smiling wearily, she drops one more kiss into Maura's hair, feather-light so as not to disturb the peace she's finally found.

_"Goodnight, sweetheart."_

As if she wasn't tired enough already at this time of night, the comforting sensation of Maura sleeping on her is always like a sleeping pill; not falling asleep at this point is the hardest part of all. The thought tempts her that Maura probably would never know if she did go to sleep now, but she refuses to take that chance.

When she thinks of it as giving her own sleep to Maura, that makes it much easier.

It's not that much longer until morning now, anyway. At least she can rest her voice now, and let her mind wander.

Her tired eyes refocus, snapping her back to the present. She hasn't fallen asleep, but she has spaced out, for long enough that she's surprised to see faint blue glowing through the window. There had been only blackness, last time she was paying attention.

Curiously, she looks to that painting on the wall across from their bed. Its light spots are just beginning to trade the nightlight's grey for the morning's blue. _It's working._ She smiles slightly, watching its color gradually fade from feeble blue to deep indigo to bright gold. It stops making sense somewhere in between.

Reaching gingerly over to the nightstand, Jane quiets the alarm before it has a chance to go off. Maura likes to keep a schedule, but it's more important now that she sleeps as long as she can.

And later in the morning, she watches Maura wake like a sleepy child. First, there's reluctance to end her slumber. Next, relief at the room full of light, and the knowledge that she has made it through the night. Mild worry at the obvious lateness of the hour, then remembering they have nowhere to be. She pries her neck out of its night-long position to look up at Jane, and her look of general fondness turns to one of realization, then apology, then adoration as she understands what Jane has done.

But no words are spoken.

The kiss Jane presses to Maura's temple is not to forgive a debt - it's to show that one was not even recorded in the first place. And she smiles at the face she knows so well, and the little lines left on it from the ribbing of her tank top. That will have to be her source of energy today.

She excuses herself to go fix breakfast.

* * *

It's almost noon on Saturday before Maura really speaks of her own volition.

They're sitting half-sideways on the couch, Jane giving her a back rub (another wordless comfort she's grateful to provide). Maura looks numb and exhausted, and it's clear that the only reason she hasn't cried yet today is because she's all cried out.

Jane is lost so deeply in thought that she almost doesn't hear that one very quiet word.

_"Stupid."_

She straightens up at attention, knowing this one word is Maura's biggest step towards opening up so far.

_Don't screw it up._

"What's that?" she asks calmly, making sure not to disrupt her massage.

"I thought I had it," she answers with a stuffy croak to her voice. "Really believed none of this was coming. Like I was.. above it. Stupid, I guess."

"Not stupid. You just feel what you feel when you feel it. You've got no way to know what to expect."

"It just hit me. There in the car. All of a sudden it..._ everything_.. and I just.. panicked. I've never had that before. Where I truly couldn't make myself do anything. It was like it'd _just_ happened. I didn't realize I hadn't felt it already, until I did."

Jane grinds her teeth. Apart from breaking the news initially, this is the closest Maura has come to actually saying anything about that day. It's not that she's suppressing it, or refuses to talk about it; it's just understood that she never intends to inflict the full details on Jane. And Jane understands; if it had been her, she would certainly never tell Maura all about it.

But she wonders if she ought to remind Maura that she's more than welcome to talk about it, if she wants to. Maybe asking a question would accomplish the same thing.

"You didn't feel like that, at the time?" Jane asks gently.

"Not really. I'm not sure I knew how to feel yet anyway."

Still pressing lines alongside her spine, Jane leans forward to rest her brow against Maura's back, feeling crushed by the weight of just wondering what it must have been like for her.

Maura must have felt so alone that day, even after help arrived. Jane wonders if Frost and Korsak's familiar faces had been a comfort to her, or just the hardest ones to hide from.

"I'm so sorry you had to go through that. And alone."

If there was a single most important moment in their lives for Jane to be there for her, that was probably it. Guilt is seeping back in, but she makes sure to keep it at bay; this is no time to steer the conversation back to herself.

"In a way, it was better," Maura says after a moment of thought. Tears are starting to seep back into her voice, although she continues speaking normally. "I _know_ alone. I'm in control alone. I can shut down to the basics.. no variables to manage.. just myself." She fidgets with the kleenex she's been clutching in her right hand all morning even though she hasn't needed it. "I can't shut out pain, but I'm fairly good at shutting out emotion. I can take pain, though. It's a normal neural process.. nerves delivering sensory input to the brain.. there's nothing inherently scary about physical pain. It's the body doing what it's supposed to do."

_Pain._

Jane blinks and watches a droplet streak down the back of Maura's shirt, leaving a short dark line. She stops her massage to wrap her arms around Maura instead.

It's not like it's a surprise to hear that there was pain involved. But somehow hearing her actually say the word makes it so much more horribly real. This whole thing is like Jane's been stabbed, and instead of the knife ever having been pulled back out, she just started to get used to it being a part of her. And now that she'd almost kind of thought about maybe possibly beginning to heal, that knife is being twisted.

Maura twists around to look at her, and regards her face with a sudden fondness, like it's the first time she's really noticed it in a while.

"You know, when we first got together..." Maura leans over to lay her head tiredly against Jane's chest, where it's spent much of the last couple of days. "After we'd make love, I'd just lay there and marvel at the way it felt when you touched me," she says, finding Jane's hand and slipping their fingers together. "Because I've been touched by people before.. people who liked me, and were trying to please me. And that was usually.. adequate. But I couldn't believe the difference, with you. It was like being touched in another language or something. One I didn't even know was my native language, until I felt it. I can _feel_, every time you touch me, that you love me. You tell me all the time, but that's how I_ know_."

Jane lays her head on top of Maura's so she can feel her nod in earnest. She closes her eyes and smiles, loving this, but also knowing it's probably leading to some very sad comparison.

"I've gotten so used to that, to the way you treat me... the most upsetting thing about that day wasn't the pain or fear. I think I cried mainly because it wasn't you. Just so... _foreign_. Some analogous physical acts.. so ugly in a different language. You make me feel like I'm the most important person in the world. That... made me feel like nothing. Not even a person."

The knife is twisting, slicing. Jane grits her teeth.

"You _are_ the most important person in the world. You should never feel like anything less," Jane murmurs, squeezing her twice as tight. "You should never have to know any other way."

"I'm far from the most important person in the world."

"I heard somebody say once that.. the world is such a different place to every person, that there really is no such thing as _the_ world. There's seven billion worlds, or however many people there are. And in the only one I can tell you about for sure, you _are_ the most important person in the world."

"And you are in mine, Jane," she answers. "But, see, that's just it. I interact mainly with the same familiar people all the time, and everyone in my world treats me with love or respect or both. And when everyone consistently treats you that way, you eventually come to believe that that actually is your value. But it's all subjective. I can be worth everything to you, and at the same time still be dirt in someone else's world. And neither is wrong. It's all perception."

"Uh, no. I am correct, and anybody who sees you as dirt is really freakin' wrong. But look, no matter what you are to anybody else, the most important thing is what you are to yourself. _That's_ your value. And yours ought to be sky-high. Everything. Please don't let this change what you think of yourself."

"It hasn't. It's just... a reality check."

Jane understands the point Maura is getting at, and even though it's not a wholly pleasant one, it is technically true. There's not much sense in debating it further.

Maura sighs, wiping her eye.

"I'm tired of crying. Why can't I just talk abou-bout it like an intelligent person instead of.."

"You gotta let it out. Sometimes you gotta talk, and sometimes you just feel like crying. Sometimes both. There's nothing wrong with that. And thanks," she adds after a pause, "For talking. I know it's not easy. I just wish I could help."

"You do help. Just being here. Although I know you have better things to do than be my pillow all weekend."

"Actually... nope, I don't. Do you feel better when I'm your pillow? Like a millionth of a percent better?"

The head beneath hers nods, bobbing hers along with it.

"Then there's nothing better I could possibly be doing."


End file.
